Harris observes that the Carnival of the year of 1781, fell on 24 February, placing Oruro's occupation exactly halfway between Candlemas and Carnival, making the situation in Oruro in Harris' words, "carnivalesque". Religious processions duelled with secular parades. Europeans and Creoles disguised as Indigenous, cases like a Spaniard resorting to cross-dressing tin a vain attempt to save his life and thousands of armed men in the streets of the colonial city.