Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c12.s7.1.4

c12.s7.1.4

The date of Bimbisāra's accession, according to this reckoning, would fall in or about 486+59=545 B.C., which is very near to the starting point of the traditional Ceylonese *Nirvāṇa* era of 544 B.C. 'The current name of an era is no proof of origins.' It is not altogether improbable that the Buddhist reckoning of Ceylon originally started from the coronation of Bimbisāra and was later on confounded with the era of the Great Decease.