A life dedicated to opening possibilities.

For decades, biographies of Serafina repeated 1883 as her year of birth. A birth record located by Rosemary Dávalos and published by MUPA instead records 9 September 1877 in Ajos (now Coronel Oviedo). This biography uses 1877 as the documented date; 1883 is retained only to explain how the earlier attribution was transmitted.

By the late 1890s, Serafina was already taking part in public life, not merely attending classes. A newspaper account from 1898 identifies her as a student at both the Escuela Normal and the Colegio Nacional and reports that she had been chosen to address the president. The press praised her intellectual abilities and envisaged higher education for her at a time when such paths remained exceptional for women.

In 1903, Serafina brought her education into public debate. Her lecture El feminismo, organised by the Society of Law Students and later published in the La Plata journal Nosotras, openly challenged inequality. In that same text, she said she was working to establish a commercial school for girls. Her writing, legal education and educational initiatives thus formed part of a single developing career.

The Girls' Mercantile College was a sustained undertaking, not a minor episode in Serafina's life. Sources differ on whether it was founded or opened in 1904 or 1905, but contemporary records show that it was operating by 1905: an advertisement names Serafina as director, sets a monthly fee and offers free tuition to students unable to pay. A 1906 payroll identifies staff, salaries and Honoria Balirán as a teacher and secretary.

A letter signed by Serafina in 1907 provides even more insight into the project: it describes free education, dependence on state subsidies, and a new plan drawn up after studying models of commercial schools in Belgium, France, the United States, and Argentina. The school continued to relate to the State, obtained an academic incorporation into the National School in 1910, continued active in 1915–1916 and is still listed under its direction in January 1921, before the reorganization documented that same year.

1907 concentrates several dimensions of Serafina's career. That year she published Humanismo and completed her legal training, although the sources do not allow the entire chronology of the degree to be reduced to a single date. The thesis is not only a university requirement: it discusses the subordination of women from biology, law, the Constitution and social organization, and converts arguments that were already circulating in its public voice into a much broader program.

Her professional career can also be traced through contemporary documents. In 1908 she was appointed to the National Council of Education. Speaking before the International Women's Congress in 1910, she said that she was practising law independently and reported that Paraguayan jurists had put her name forward for the Superior Tribunal; it has not been established, however, that she ever held that post. Court records and professional directories document her presence in legal practice until the mid-1920s.

Serafina's participation in reform networks and women's organizations did not end with the 1910 congress. In 1916 she appeared as secretary of the Paraguayan National Committee for the First American Children's Congress; In 1920 she appears linked to the statutes commission of the Paraguayan Feminist Center; In 1936, the Paraguayan Women's Union elected her councilor.

In the 1950s, Serafina appeared again in records of the Paraguayan League for Women's Rights: sources identify her as a council member and later honorary president. Accounts differ on her precise role in the League's founding in 1951, so this biography does not label her a founder without documentary support. What is clear is the continuity of her influence: successive generations of women's rights organisations continued to recognise her as an active figure.

Serafina's private life is one of the areas where the archive requires more caution. The institutional documentation places Honoria Balirán alongside her as early as 1906, as a professor and secretary of the Mercantile College. Decades later, testimonies and retrospective memories used expressions such as private secretary, inseparable companion or life partner. These formulas are preserved attributed to their sources: they are not transformed into a self-definition that Serafina and Honoria did not leave documented.

The house allows us to follow another material history. The official heritage assessment places its construction in 1914, although a contract, original plan, permit and contemporary architectural authorship are still missing. The domain records prove that Honoria was the owner of Property 3,335 before January 1957, that the State purchased the property that month and that in 1963 it was registered in favor of the IPS. The link that explains how and when Honoria acquired the property is still missing.

Serafina died on September 27, 1957. Reconstructing her last months, however, requires carefully separating registry documents, memories and subsequent accusations. The sale of the house to the State in January 1957 is documented; Other stories about residences, money and property appear later and do not have the same evidentiary weight.

Press reports from 1957–1959 identify Case No. 154/1957 and preserve testimony, accusations and a public defence concerning Honoria Balirán and Serafina's final years. Neither the original case file nor its judicial outcome has yet been recovered. This account therefore distinguishes documented facts from allegations and does not claim to know how the case ended.

Serafina's memory moved beyond the pages of history books. Since the mid-2000s, her name has appeared in feminist cultural spaces such as La Serafina. Between 2019 and 2024, new biographies, comics and theatrical works retold her life for different audiences. These varied forms show how a historical figure can acquire new meanings without diminishing the need to return to the sources.

In 2026, memory also acquired a specific heritage and institutional dimension: Law 7679 created a national commission to restore and enhance the Serafina Dávalos House and provides for the property to function as a memory center for women's struggles and rights. The subsequent installation of a work table opened a new stage, but it is not yet equivalent to a completed restoration. The legacy, in that sense, continues to occur in the present tense.