Editing Black Watch (section)

== Origin of the name ==
{{See also|Independent Highland Companies}}
The source of the regiment's name is uncertain. In 1725, following the [[Jacobite rising of 1715|Jacobite rebellion of 1715]], General [[George Wade]] was authorised by [[George I of Great Britain|George I]] to form six "watch" companies to patrol the Highlands of [[Scotland]], three from [[Clan Campbell]], one from [[Clan Fraser of Lovat]], one from [[Clan Munro]] and one from [[Clan Grant]]. These were to be "employed in disarming the Highlanders, preventing depredations, bringing criminals to justice, and hindering rebels and attainted persons from inhabiting that part of the kingdom." [[Francis Hindes Groome]] states in his ''Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland'' (1901) that the watch was "embodied in a field [in [[Aberfeldy, Perth and Kinross|Aberfeldy]]] in 1739".<ref name=og24>[https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=ZrGM8n_uNOcC ''Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland: A Graphic and Accurate Description of Every Place in Scotland''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210915014320/https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=ZrGM8n_uNOcC&pcampaignid=books_web_aboutlink |date=15 September 2021}}, Frances Hindes Groome (1901), p. 24</ref> The force was known in [[Scottish Gaelic|Gaelic]] as ''Am Freiceadan Dubh,'' "the dark" or "black watch".<ref>Simpson, p. 114–115</ref>

This epithet may have come from the uniform plaids of dark [[tartan]] with which the companies were provided. Other theories have been put forward; for instance, that the name referred to the "black hearts" of the pro-government militia who had sided with the "enemies of true Highland spirit",<ref>Parker, p. 13–14</ref> or that it came from their original duty in policing the Highlands, namely preventing "blackmail" (Highlanders demanding extortion payments to spare cattle herds).<ref>Trevor-Roper, p. 205</ref>