The residents of the southern Spanish town of Ibi splattered each other with flour and eggs on Friday as they celebrated the Els Enfarinats festival, a tradition dating back more than 200 years.

The festival sees a group don military clothing and stage a coup, declaring new rules on the small town and collecting fines from residents who fall foul of them.

The collected money is donated to charity with the residents restoring order by overthrowing them in a messy battle involving hundreds of eggs, kilos of flour and firecrackers.

The festival is held every December 28 as part of the festivities to mark the Day of Innocents, a Christian feast day remembering the Biblical story of King Herod killing children.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.