Professor Tom McCollough will speak March 23 at 5 p.m. in the Wall Auditorium at Coastal Carolina University on Roman Imperialism and the Search for the Historical Jesus.

Sponsored by Coastals Department of Philosophy and Religion, Phi Sigma Tau and the Philosophy Club, the lecture is free and open to the public.

McCollough is a professor of religion and history at Centre College in Danville, Ky., where he has taught since 1980. He holds the Nelson D. and Mary McDowell Rodes Professorship. He has particular expertise in the history of Christianity and Christian thought, biblical history and archaeology and the contemporary Middle East.

Since 1985 McCollough has been the assistant director of archaelogical digs in Sepphoris, Israel, where he involves a number of Centre students for summer excavations. In 1992 and 1993, he and his students were part of a team that uncovered amulets estimated to be around 2,000 years old. At the beginning of 2002, McCollough also became the assistant director for the archaeological excavations of Khirbet Kana.

McCollough is a co-editor, along with Douglas R. Edwards, of Archaeology and the Galilee: Text and Context in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods (Scholars Press, 1997). He also has published articles in academic journals including Studi Patristica and Religious Studies Review. McCollough has forthcoming books titled Ancient Christian Commentary of the Book of Daniel and another co-edited book titled The Archaeology of Difference. He recently received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship to support his research and publication of the excavations at Sepphoris.

McCollough earned a bachelors degree from the University of Florida and masters and doctoral degrees from the University of Notre Dame. He also has a master of divinity degree from Duke University.

For more information, call 349-2440.