Reference: Watches Of The Night
Fausets
The Jews reckoned three military watches: the "first" or beginning of the watches (La 2:19), from sunset to ten o'clock; the second or "middle watch" was from ten until two o'clock (Jg 7:19); the third, "the morning watch," from two to sunrise (Ex 14:24; 1Sa 11:11). Afterward under the Romans they had four watches (Mt 14:25): Lu 12:38, "even, midnight, cockcrowing, and morning" (Mr 13:35); ending respectively at 9 p.m., midnight, 3 a.m., and 6 a.m. (compare Ac 12:4.) Watchmen patrolled the streets (Song 3:3; 5:7; Ps 127:1).
See Verses Found in Dictionary
In the morning watch the Lord looked down on the Egyptian army through the pillar of fire and cloud, and he threw the Egyptian army into a panic.
Gideon took a hundred men to the edge of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, just after they had changed the guards. They blew their trumpets and broke the jars they were carrying.
A song of ascents, by Solomon. If the Lord does not build a house, then those who build it work in vain. If the Lord does not guard a city, then the watchman stands guard in vain.
The night watchmen found me -- the ones who guard the city walls. "Have you seen my beloved?"
The watchmen found me as they made their rounds in the city. They beat me, they bruised me; they took away my cloak, those watchmen on the walls!
(Qof) Get up! Cry out in the night when the night watches start! Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord! Lift up your hands to him for your children's lives; they are fainting at every street corner.
Stay alert, then, because you do not know when the owner of the house will return -- whether during evening, at midnight, when the rooster crows, or at dawn --
Even if he comes in the second or third watch of the night and finds them alert, blessed are those slaves!
When he had seized him, he put him in prison, handing him over to four squads of soldiers to guard him. Herod planned to bring him out for public trial after the Passover.