Maximum number of factions in a battle

I was just wondering if there is a limit to how many sides can appear in a single battle, of if the only limit is how many can reach the same province in a single year. I have never seen more than four in a single battle. How many have you seen and in what circumstances?

In my case, I was playing the Italians (vanilla, no VI) and invaded Serbia ( think) by sea. My Byantine and Hungarian allies obligingly showed up and stormed the slope that the rebels were defending. By the time my almost entirely infantry army reached the rebels, it was all over. Since I took no casulaties, I had the most survivors and got the province without even drawing my sword or loosing an arrow. I regretted it later though. I had to garrison the province well so my Byzantine and Hungarian friends wouldn't decide to turn against me to take an easy province, and I did not dare develop it much in case one of my pals did take it away from me. Could have made better use of those troops!

"friendship" is a relative term dealing with the computer. My Polish "friends" didnt hesitate to backstab me when the Hungarians started to cut through southeastern Germany.

I think the limit is eight, althrough I could be mistaken. It could be tested through the custom battle menu.

What Unknown guy said, I think the limit is eight, of course I'm going with the limit for a custom battle, which is 8, I don't actually know what it is during the campaign, but i think it'd be 8 as well.

In an actual campaign is probably less, as it would reçuire a province having borders with eight factions. There is no province with more than four borders, I think, so the practical max number in a campaign would be around four.
Actually, caveat: Jihads and crusades. These would increase the max number of armies present. Theoretically, if you are Byzantium and have an army at Constantinople, Greece is held by the Hungarians and Bulgaria by the Poles, whereas the Golden Horde holds Trebizond, the turks hold Anatolia, and in that instant, arrive crusades from Castile, Aragon, Sicly, Italy, England, France, and the HRE, and you suffer threeo naval invasions, one from the Almohads, other from the danes, and another from Russia, and the Egyptians somehow slipped in a Jihad, and suddenly the peasants decided to rebel...

That´s the worst possible scenario I can think of.

Umm.. I tried it. The game crashed when it went to the prebattle screen. Couldn't get the peasants to rebel though.

(I suspected something of that sort happening)