Uttar Pradesh Quiz: Ancient Uttar Pradesh: Mahajanapadas, Buddhism and Jainism

Magadha lay on the southern bank of the Ganga, in the region of present day Patna, Gaya and Nalanda, with its early capital at Rajagriha among the hills and later at Pataliputra at the meeting of the Ganga and the Son.

The Vatsa mahajanapada lay in the Ganga and Yamuna doab with its capital at Kaushambi, and its best known ruler was Udayana, who appears in Sanskrit literature and in Buddhist texts alike.

After his enlightenment the Buddha walked to the deer park at Sarnath near Varanasi and preached to the five ascetics who had been his companions.

Kushinara, the Kushinagar of today in eastern Uttar Pradesh, was a town of the Malla mahajanapada, and the Buddha died there between two sal trees at the age of eighty, a death traditionally dated to 483 BCE and remembered as the mahaparinirvana.

The capital of the Ashokan pillar at Sarnath carries four lions standing back to back on an abacus bearing four wheels and four animals, and it was adopted as the State Emblem of India on 26 January 1950.

Kosala lay in the central and eastern plain of Uttar Pradesh with Shravasti as its capital and Saketa, the Ayodhya of today, as a second centre.

Jain tradition holds that Parshvanatha, the twenty third tirthankara and the immediate predecessor of Mahavira, was born at Varanasi as a prince of that city, and he is remembered as the teacher whose followers Mahavira's order absorbed.

Panchala was divided into a northern and a southern half, and Ahichchhatra in Bareilly district was the capital of the north while Kampilya in Farrukhabad was the capital of the south.

Alamgirpur stands on the bank of the Hindon, a tributary of the Yamuna, in Meerut district, and it is taken as the eastern limit of the Harappan civilisation; pottery, beads and the impression of cloth are among its finds.

Anathapindika, a wealthy merchant of Shravasti, bought a grove from prince Jeta and built the Jetavana monastery there for the Buddha and the order, and the Buddha is said to have passed more rainy season retreats at Shravasti than anywhere else.