Contact: Rick Peterson, Manager of News Services, 920/832-6590
For Immediate Release	 			February 24, 1999

UW Art Historian Discusses Excavations at Sardis in Lawrence
Archaeological Lecture 


          APPLETON, WIS. -- The most recent findings of excavation work at the
ancient city of Sardis will be discussed in an Appleton Society of the
Archaeological Institute of America slide-illustrated lecture Monday, March
8 at Lawrence University by UW-Madison art historian Nick Cahill.
     The presentation, at 7:30 p.m. in Lawrence's Wriston Art Center
auditorium, is free and open to the public.  An informal reception follows
the program. 
     Cahill, assistant professor of art history at UW-Madison, has been
involved in excavations at Sardis for nearly 20 years.  His field research
at the one-time large and prosperous city near the Aegean coast in
west-central Turkey has helped uncover gold refineries from the Lydian
empire dating to 650 B.C., a Roman bath and a small Middle Byzantine church,
among other remains.
     A specialist on the relationship between ancient Greece and the Middle
East, Cahill has conducted archaeological excavations in Greece, Israel and
England as well as Sardis.  
     Cahill's appearance is sponsored by UW-Madison's "On the Road" program,
a series of statewide community events featuring faculty, staff and students
in celebration of UW's sesquicentennial.