At the start of Lent, men dressed as rampaging creatures pursue women through medieval villages. The families who maintain these traditions are sceptical of change, but increasingly female revellers want to play more active parts

In the early afternoon of Ash Wednesday, dread creatures dressed in white walk the streets of the medieval southern French village of Cournonterral. They wear long masks of black badger hair, top hats crowned by feathers and sprays of boxwood, and body armour comprising sacks stuffed with straw. Despite the early hours, some of them stagger from drink, whips of hessian sacking dangling from their hands.

These menacing characters are exclusively male – the only women taking part in the traditional festivities today are their prey. Among les blancs – also dressed in white but with no armour except red ribbons in their hair and around their waists – are a few teenage girls in heavy makeup.