The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c24.66

v1.c24.66

It is only when we come to the reigns of Bimbisāra and Ajātaçatru in the Çiçunāga dynasty that we find the firm ground of history. At this period lived Mahāvīra and Buddha, the founders, or perhaps rather the reformers, of Jainism and Buddhism; and now the Purāṇas are supplemented by two other lines of tradition which are presumably independent. In the Jain accounts Bimbisāra appears as Çreṇika and Ajātaçatru as Kūṇika: the former began the expansion of Magadha by the conquest of the kingdom of Aṅga (Monghyr and Bhāgalpur), and the latter is said to have come to the throne after the death of Mahāvīra and a few years before the death of Buddha.