Plans for the conquest of Melilla, a port on the Mediterranean coast of Morocco, known to the Phoenicians as Rusaddir, and successively held by the Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines, and Moors, had been laid juts after the Fall of Granada in 1492.

Spanish captains Lezcano and Lorenzo Zafra had visited the coast of Northwestern Africa to identify possible locations for the Spanish to conquere, and Melilla had been identified as a prime candidate.

However, Melilla was in the Portuguese zone of influence under the terms of the 1479 Treaty of Alcáçovaz.

At Tordesillas in 1494, the Portuguese ruler had agreed to make an exception and permitted the Spanish to attempt the conquest of Melilla.

Melilla is part of the Wattasid Sultanate of Morocco when the Catholic Monarchs, Queen Isabella I of Castile and King Ferdinand II of Aragon, request of Juan Alfonso Pérez de Guzmán, 3rd Duke of Medina Sidonia, to take the city.

The duke disparches Pedro Estopiñán, who conquers the city virtually without a fight in 1497, as internal conflicts had depleted it of troops, and its defenses had been weakened.

The Moroccan Wattasid ruler Muhammad al-Shaykh sends a detachment of cavalrymen to retake control of the city, but they are repulsed by the guns of the Spanish ships.