Has there ever been a battle with three warring factions?

Answer

Hi Peter,

No, most battles are between two sides.

That is also understandable. When three sides openly oppose each other, it’s called a “Mexican stand-off” and there’s really little reason to start fighting. Whoever attacks first has a great disadvantage: if he wins, he has to deal with the third; if he loses, the other two sides will waltz over him. So you usually have to wait and see.

Or other solutions have been chosen in the course of history:

• For example, in a war with many parties, it is better to join another army that wants roughly but not quite the same. Then you get alliances. The Ancient Greeks already did this by temporarily deploying their separate armies together. Spartans and Athenians often fought each other (each with allies, in the ‘Pelloponesian Wars’), but they could also form a large army together against Persians or Trojans.
• Another approach is to wait until all other parties have tired each other out, and then strike a day later. This strategy is best known for the succession of the English king Edward the Confessor in 1066. William the Conqueror was one of the candidate successors, but first waited until his opponents had weakened or killed each other in battles, and then just over Hastings to be reckoned with the battle-weary English army that had marched south in haste from the battle of Stamford Bridge.
• And in some battles it happened that parts sometimes switched sides. For example, at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, the Stanley brothers, initially on the side of Henry III (House of Lancaster) and eventually sided with Henry VII (House of York), chose the opposite side of Henry VII (House of York), when it became clear that who was winning.

Three fighting armies in one battle? Not to my knowledge…