The subject of this final work was to analyze female characters in short stories from the 19th century, listing out of the three literary periods one short story that served us as an example. Starting from the period of the Croatian national revival, we analyzed female characters in a short story called „Jedna noć“ by Dimitrija Demeter. We came to a conclusion that the characters of Vukosava and Milica are static and submissive to the patriarchy fulfilling their roles of obedient daughters. The literary period of „protorealizam“ or „prerealism“ is in the mark of August Šenoa and that is the reason why we picked his short story „Prijan Lovro“ as an exemplary text. In that short story there are multiple female characters but with very similar characteristics so that is why most of them belong to a group of „house angels“ (Lovro's mother, the widow, Anđelija) or to a group of „promotors of purity and innocence“ (Malvina, Minka). The last period, realism, is the most dinamic in the aspect of female characters already with the fact that as the main character Josip Kozarac uses BiserKata in the same named short story. The protagonist will stand out with her innocence and nonconformist streak to the point where we will clasify her as „femme fragile“. Her absolute contradictions are Fema and Manda who with their behaviour completely embody „femme fatale“.