Friendly forces recognition

[ubique]

I was reading about  Brunanburh some weeks ago and once the close order fighting was complete the victors began to hunt down the small bands of retreating enemy until darkness.
 
This got me thinking after the close order fighting between say Mercia and Wessex had concluded and the victors began hunting down the withdrawing enemy for there weapons and Armour or to take them as slaves how would these bands on both sides know who was friend and who was foe when both sides spoke the same language and were armed and dressed similarly?
 
My only thoughts on this are each formation may have had a different paint scheme on shields or standards?
 
Any Idea ?

[Bowerthane]

I’m sure we had a long thread about this on the old forum, Ubique, because I recollect making the following contribution to that.  I definitely read something by a member of Regia Anglorum prepared to vouch for battle-cries as a form of recognition.  Once a shield-wall breaks down and you’re into the cut-and-thrust of a melee, he said, it was fatally easy ( and not uncommon) to hear the words, “But I was on your side!” wheezing from some woeful wight he’d just struck down in his prime.

One solution he vouched for was to keep shouting your own side’s battle-cry, which he compared to whistling whilst using a toilet without a lock on it.


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[ubique]

Many thanks sounds like its safer in the shield wall getting your shins sliced off

[Wulfric]

Having dabbled on the reenactment battlefield I'll vouch for the general benefits of banners, shield patterns and war cries in not killing or being killed by friends. Trouble is that all three, but particularly the latter two are open to abuse by the brave/foolish. Shields and banners can be picked up and where accents are not important war cries can be imitated. Even before the battle breaks into fragmented skirmishes it is possible to be cut down by those you trusted because they were shouting your war cry. This is especially true in the terrifying moment when the shield wall twists and turns.

I feel accent may have played a large part in telling who someone really was. There are examples In the lowlands where there were so many different local dialects and accents and where there was so much warfare in later medieval times of combatants using words or phrases that were difficult to pronounce unless you were a native speaker. The key here is not a difference of language but pronunciation.