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Corporal is a military rank in use by the armed forces of many countries. It is also a police rank in some police services. The rank is usually the lowest ranking non-commissioned officer. In some militaries, the rank of corporal nominally corresponds to commanding a section or squad of soldiers.
The word is a contraction from the medieval Italian phrase capo corporale (transl. head of a body [of soldiers]). While most Indo-European languages use the contraction, West Iberian languages use cabo.