In the bright-blue Mediterranean Sea, sitting just west of the better part of Italy is an island on which falls golden-yellow rays of luminous sunshine.  A young man is not paying the sun much mind, however. He digs. Sweat soaks his hair, sticking it to his body. His shoulders ache and he continues to dig, looking up only when Steven Ellis, the current boss on this island, hollers down some instructions. 

Ellis, an associate professor of classics at the University of Cincinnati, is the director of the Tharros project, a multi-year dig at this town of the same name located on the island's west coast. Ellis hopes the project will help him understand how ancient Roman cities grew over time. He is working to uncover Tharros all the way, from its founding to its abandonment.