GREATER MAGADH

The Indian subcontinent c. 500 BCE, during the Mahajanpad period. By 500 BCE, the ancient Kuru-Panchal realm had already declined and given way to influences from the eastern Magadh region

Greater Magadh is a concept in studies of the early history of India. It is used to refer to the political and cultural sphere that developed in the lower Gangetic plains during the Vedic age. The sraman culture of Greater Magadh developed separately from the orthodox Brahmin-oriented sraut culture to its west, that was characteristic of the upper Ganges basin (the Ganga-Yamuna doab).

The name derives from a later kingdom, Magadh, that arose in the same region after the Vedic period had ended.

Overview :

The concept was developed in a book by the indologist Johannes Bronkhorst (2007), where he defines the region to comprise modern day Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh.

Out of the ideological opposition between these two cultural spheres – the orthodox srauta realm of Kuru-Panchal in the west, and Greater Magadh in the east – developed the two main spiritual ideologies of Vedic India. Sraut practiced by Brahmans, which placed a lot of importance on the system of Yagya and ritual correctness, arose out of the culture of the erstwhile Kuru-Panchal realm, while the sraman tradition, which placed emphasis on the spiritual striving towards liberation, that developed in Greater Magadh, later to give rise to the Buddhism and Jainism.

Source :

https://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Greater_Magadha