In this second panel, the chronicler Hurtado de Mendoza, though his descriptions of the war in the Alpujarras, published posthumously in 1627, illustrates the living conditions and other hardships that unleashed the Morisco conflicts.

The Morisco population of Bentomiz fluctuated significantly during the period in question, from a high of more than 10,000 at the end of the XVth century to approximately 7,000 at the time of the conflict. It is estimated that at this time the population of Málaga was 20,000 at most, and that of Velez Málaga, no more than 3,000, given that the population of the entire Granada Kingdom totalled 275,000, of whom 125,000 were Moriscos.

The peaceful land described by Hurtado cannot be considered to be a permanent feature of the region, rather than one of a number of interludes typical in a zone of confrontation. There were eighty years of harassment, with serious retributions by the Holy Inquisition, confiscation of possessions, intolerable physical oppression, insults and contempt heaped upon people, their religion and culture, towards which and from the beginning, the Moriscos had responded with active hostility with a proliferation of bandit groups who gave support to the Berber incursions, increasing the levels of violence and spreading alarm and panic among the Christian population.