- Sergeant Major General
Sergeant Major General is a now extinct
military rank that can trace its origins to theMiddle Ages . Originally simplySergeant Major Fact|date=May 2007, the title - unlike the modern military rank of the same name - signified ageneral officer , commander of an army'sinfantry and typically third in command of the army as a whole (after theLieutenant General andCaptain General ); he also acted as a sort of chief of staff.Early in the 17th century, individual
regiments began appointing their own Sergeants Major to perform a similar role on a smaller scale (these evolved into modern-dayMajor s): the older, senior position became known as Sergeant Major General to distinguish it.Over the course of the 17th century, the increasing professionalisation of armies saw Sergeant Major General become the most junior of the general ranks. At the same time, the "Sergeant" portion of the title was more and more commonly dropped; by the early 18th century, the rank's name had been permanently shortened to
Major General .Since Sergeant Major General had ranked below
Lieutenant General , the newly named rank of Major General appeared to create a precedence issue, in that aMajor outranks aLieutenant but a Lieutenant General outranks a Major General. This continues to cause confusion to those unfamiliar with the history of the rank, particularly in those armies using insignia similar to the British army.In the 21st century, the rank of Sergeant Major General has ceased to exist but nearly every country in the world maintains the rank of Major General or a close equivalent. The rank is also referred to as a "Two Star General", most often in countries which maintain the lower rank of
Brigadier General .
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