In pictures: Ghouls come out to play for Austrian festive parade

Revellers donned goat-horned devil masks and black sheepskin coats to take part in the annual Saint Nicolas play in Bad Mitterndorf in Austria on Monday.

The festive tradition, known as the Nikolospiel, takes places every year on December 5 and involves a performance of a religious play across the town, with the various figures forming a procession between venues.

The play's sequences have remained largely unchanged over centuries - with performances by characters including the Krampus (the goat-horned devil), an angel and Bishop Nicholas. An accompanying priest also tests children present on their knowledge of religious rules.

Between the performances, the characters form a long, masked procession that is led by the "Schab", a group of men wrapped in straw with five-metre horns. The "Schab" clear the way for the various characters by loudly cracking their whips in an eight-beat pattern.

The first written sources relating to the play date back to the 19th century, but the texts were previously passed down orally for decades.

The moral messages of the tradition relate to the maintenance of order, the observance of laws and rules, and obedience as the path to divine mercy.

One of the most recognisable characters is the Krampus, a ghoulish character that in European folklore is an assistant of Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus.

The figure has been part of pre-Christmas folklore in Alpine regions for centuries, and during the Advent season typically scares children who have misbehaved.

On the night of December 5, Saint Nicholas visits children who have behaved well, rewarding them with modest gifts such as oranges, dried fruit and chocolate. Meanwhile, Krampus punishes the badly-behaved with birch rods.

In some traditional parades, such as the Krampuslauf, young men dress up as the figure and attempt to scare the public with their antics while roaming through the streets.