The topic of the study is the depiction of the literary form of "The Other." This is examined comparatively to determine whether different historical contexts produce converging or diverging foreign portraits.

Through linguistic analysis, the semantic features of the description of The Other and the underlying conceptualization strategies are systematically and exhaustively documented in 43 selected texts from two independently created series.

The result is the identification of remarkably similar cognitive mechanisms in the conceptualization of The Other (reduction, selection, generalization, stereotypes) as well as culturally specific differences in conceptualization between Spanish romances and Romanian ballads.