During the twenty months which followed the victory of Issus, Alexander continued to make fresh conquests and to consolidate those already made. He subdued Syria--a name which must be taken to include both Phœnicia and Palestine. Here the two cities of Tyre and Gaza made an obstinate resistance, the two detaining him for no less than nine months. Egypt, which hated its intolerant Persian masters, gave itself up without a struggle. Early in 331 he heard that Darius had collected another huge army, with which to make another effort for his kingdom. The king had lost the western half of his dominions, but the eastern still remained to him, and from this he drew forces which exceeded in number even the great host which he had put into the field at Issus. The meeting-place was at Arbela, a place still known by the slightly changed name of Erbil, and situated on the caravan-route between Erzeroum and Bagdad; but the actual battlefield must be looked for some twenty miles away in a level region known by the name of Gaugamela. On the extreme right were the Medes, once the ruling people of Asia and still mindful of their old renown, the Parthian cavalry, and the sturdy mountaineers of the Caucasus; on the opposite wing were the Bactrians--mostly hardy dwellers in the hills, and famous both for activity and for fierceness--and the native Persians, horse and foot, in alternate formation. But it was in the centre of the line, round the person of Darius, where he stood conspicuous on his royal chariot, that the choicest troops of the Empire were congregated. Here were ranged the Persian Horseguards--a force levied from the noblest families of the race that had ruled Western Asia for more than two centuries. They were known by the proud title of "Kinsmen of the King," and the Footguards, also a _corps d'élite_, who carried apples at the butt-end of their pikes. Next to these stood the Carians, probably a colony from the well-known people of that name in Asia Minor, possibly transported by some Persian king to a settlement in the East. Of all Asiatic races the Carians had shown themselves the most apt to learn the Greek discipline and to rival Greek valour. Next to the Carians, again, stood the Greek mercenaries. In front of the line were the scythed chariots, numbering two hundred in all, each with its sharp-pointed sides projecting far beyond the horses, and its sword-blades and scythes stretching from the yoke and from the naves of the wheels. (This is the first time that we hear of the scythed chariot. It was a device of a barbarian kind, and seldom, as far as we know, very effective.) Behind the line, again, was a large mixed multitude, drawn from every tribe that still owned the Great King's sway.