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BUDDHIST INDIA
its further advance by the powerful confederation of the Licchavis. South of these, again, a death-struggle was going on between the two smaller kingdoms of Magadha and Champā. This was decided in the time of the Buddha's boyhood by the final victory of Magadha. And the rising of this new star in the extreme south-east was the most interesting factor in the older picture.
The new picture, as shown to us in the Ceylon Chronicles and in the Greek accounts of India, especially in those fragments that have survived of the Indika of Megasthenes (300 B.C.), shows us Magadha triumphant. The free clans and the great kingdom of Kosala have been absorbed by it. One by one the kingdoms to the south and west of what had been Kosala have acknowledged its supremacy. In distant Punjab and Ujjen viceroys from Magadha administer the government. And for the first time in the history of India there is one authority from Afghanistan across the continent eastward to Bengal, and from the Himālayas down to the central Provinces.
We shall probably never know-unless the ancient sites in India shall one day, like those in Assyria and Egypt, be excavated and explored-how these great changes came actually to be brought about. But the two sets of authorities just referred to (which are quite independent one of another, and yet confirm one another in the most important matters) are conclusive evidence that the changes had actually taken place.
Taken separately, each of these authorities is
Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
