Magadha also called the Kingdom of Magadha or the Magadha Empire, was a kingdom and empire, and one of the sixteen Mahajanapadas, 'Great Kingdoms' of the Second Urbanization, based in southern Bihar in the eastern Ganges Plain, in Ancient India. Magadha was ruled by the Brihadratha dynasty, the Pradyota dynasty, the Haryanka dynasty, the Shaishunaga dynasty, the Nanda dynasty, the Mauryan dynasty, the Shunga dynasty and the Kanva dynasty. It lost much of its territory after being defeated by the Satavahanas of Deccan in 28 BC and was reduced to a small principality around Pataliputra. Under the Mauryas, Magadha became a pan-Indian empire, covering large swaths of the Indian subcontinent and Afghanistan.
Magadha empire under Kanva dynasty
Cyclopean Wall of Rajgir which encircled the former capital of Magadha, Rajgir. Amongst the oldest pieces of cyclopean masonry in the world
King Bimbisara visits the Bamboo Garden (Venuvana) in Rajagriha; artwork from Sanchi.
Magadha kingdom coin, c. 350 BCE, Karshapana
The Mahājanapadas were sixteen kingdoms or aristocratic republics that existed in ancient India from the sixth to fourth centuries BCE, during the second urbanisation period.
Pottery of the Northern Black Polished Ware culture (c. 500–200 BCE)
Silver coin of Avanti mahajanapada (4th century BCE)
Coin of Early Gandhara Janapada: AR Shatamana and one-eighth Shatamana (round), Taxila-Gandhara region, c. 600–300 BCE.
A coin of Takshashila, portrays a tree flanked by a hill surmounted by a crescent and a Nandipada above a swastika.