Where does the River Gipping originate?

The River Gipping is the source river for the River Orwell in the county of Suffolk in East Anglia, England, which is named from the village of Gipping, and which gave its name to the former Gipping Rural District. The name is unrelated to the name of Ipswich. It rises near Mendlesham Green and flows in a south-westerly direction to reach Stowmarket. From there it flows towards the south or south east, passing through Needham Market and a number of villages to reach Ipswich, where it becomes the Orwell. The river has supplied power to a number of watermills, several of which are still standing. None are operational, although the mill at Baylham retains most of its machinery, and is the only complete mill on the river.

River Gipping

There is evidence that the river was used for navigation in the thirteenth and seventeenth centuries, but in 1790, an Act of Parliament was obtained to enable the river to be improved from Ipswich to Stowmarket. This was achieved by building 15 locks, and the river was then known as the Ipswich and Stowmarket Navigation, although the name has now fallen out of use. The navigation was opened in 1793, and although few records were kept of income and expenditure, the enterprise appears to have been profitable. In 1819, there was talk of expansion, but nothing came of the plans. In the 1840s, as railways arrived in the area, the Trustees negotiated with the Eastern Union Railway, and the navigation was leased to them for 42 years. At the end of the lease, it was in a poor state, despite the fact that the railway had a legal duty to maintain it.

Traffic to Stowmarket did not recover, but there was some traffic through the lower four locks, with barges serving the Fison's and Packard's fertiliser factories at Bramford. By 1917, it was no longer economical to keep it open, and it closed in 1922, although a formal closing order was not obtained until the early 1930s. After a period of decay, the local branch of the Inland Waterways Association raised the idea of restoring it. The River Gipping Trust now spearhead this work, and several of the lock chambers have been restored, while the Gipping Valley River Path had been established along the towpath. There are many listed buildings along the course of the river, including some of the locks and bridges, several of the mill buildings, and Fison's fertiliser warehouse at Bramford.

Early recorded use of the river includes the transporting of stone which was used in the rebuilding of Bury St Edmunds Abbey. The stone was carried in flat-bottomed boats to Rattlesden. Although some sources record that it was Caen stone imported from Normandy, the stone actually came from quarries at Barnack in Northamptonshire, which were owned by the abbot of Peterborough. There is also some confusion about the date of this activity, and whether it was for the original building of the abbey between 1070 and 1095, or for a rebuilding in the thirteenth century. It is more certain that Stowmarket church bells were recast in the seventeenth century after being transported down-river.

The first proposal for the construction of the navigation was in 1719, but the traders of Ipswich objected, fearing loss of trade. It was not until 1789 that six local gentlemen (two of whom were vicars) with foresight realised that because of poor transport, due to badly-maintained turnpike roads, the population and industries were dwindling in the Stowmarket area. They engaged William Jessop, who employed Isaac Lenny as the surveyor and a Parliamentary Bill for the construction of the navigation was introduced on 17 February 1790. It became an Act of Parliament on 1 April 1790, and created a Board of Trustees, consisting of six men. They were empowered to borrow £14,300 to finance the work, and an additional £6,000 if this became necessary. They also had powers to build an extension of the navigation from Stowupland Bridge for to the turnpike road that ran to Bury St Edmunds. An unusual clause in the act prohibited the carrying of fishing tackle by boats using the navigation, for which a fine of £5 could be charged.

The first meeting of the new company took place on 19 April 1790, and Jessop was asked to prepare drawings which would form the basis for tenders. The directors also decided to advertise for a surveyor, and on 7 June they appointed James Smith from Reading. They expected the navigation to be finished by October 1791, and so Smith's contract only ran until then. At the same meeting they appointed Mr Baynes of Stowmarket to handle legal matters, and Dyson and Pinkerton as contractors. Both were members of civil engineering families, whose careers had developed since the 1760s, and who had collaborated on a number of schemes, making them the first civil engineering contractors. John Dyson Sr had worked with James Pinkerton on the Adlingfleet Drainage scheme, the Driffield Navigation and the Laneham Drainage scheme, but for this project, he worked with George Pinkerton, thought to be one of James' younger sons.

Work started in 1790 at the Ipswich end of the navigation, but there were problems. Baynes was sacked after less than a month, because of "unaccommodating and improper behaviour", and in November, Dyson and Pinkerton were dismissed for trespassing on land which did not belong to the Trustees. Legal action followed, which caused delays and involved the Trustees in extra costs, although some work carried on during the lawsuit. Smith set up a brickworks in January 1791, and a contract to build six locks was awarded to Samual Wright of Ipswich in June. Because of the dispute, the Ipswich end was not sufficiently completed to enable materials to be carried up the navigation, and so they had to be carried overland to enable work on the Stowmarket end to continue. A verdict was reached in the dispute between Dyson and Pinkerton and the Trustees on 14 November 1791, but the outcome is unclear.

The Trustees next asked the civil engineer John Rennie to assess the state of the project. His inspection was carried out in the presence of the Trustees on 13–15 December 1791, and he produced a report within a week. He reported that the section from Stowmarket and Needham Market, the other main town on the waterway, was almost complete, but advised that the towpath would need to be raised in places. There were three turf and timber locks, but he suggested that further locks should be made of brick. He felt that while Jessop had laid out the plans prior to the obtaining of the initial Act of Parliament, there had been a failure to adequately survey the river and detail the works that would be required to construct the navigation. He particularly criticised Lenny's lack of accuracy, and recommended that a new survey should be made, so that the work needed could be identified.

He made his next report to the Trustees on 23 April 1792. He estimated that £12,762 would be required to finish the work, of which £6,600 would be needed for the remaining 12 locks, which he thought could be built for £550 each. He then inspected the lower river, and agreed that Jessop's original site for the junction between the navigation and the River Orwell was the best available. He suggested that the timber locks should be rebuilt, once the navigation began to make a profit, and recommended that another Act of Parliament should be obtained, to raise more money. The Act was obtained on 28 March 1793, which authorised the Trustees to borrow an extra £15,000, as the original capital had all been spent. The final cost of construction was £26,263, which was nearly double the original estimate. The waterway was just under long from Ipswich to Stowmarket, rising through 15 locks of broad construction each, suitable for barges with a draught of. It was opened throughout on 14 September 1793.

The main cargoes on the navigation consisted of agricultural produce which travelled down stream, with coal and other heavy goods travelling in the opposite direction. Initially, there were up to four barges working on the navigation, and tolls for the first year amounted to £460. The number of barges then increased to 10 but frost and flooding in early 1795 caused serious damage, and £1,000 had to be spent on repairs. Despite a short-term fall in income, the tolls for the year ending in July 1795 came to £937. Subsequently, details of receipts were not recorded in the minutes of the Trustees, so are unknown, but they did record that barges were making over 30 trips each week in the early 1800s. Each trip took around seven hours. James Austin was appointed as surveyor in October 1804, but absconded in 1805. The Trustees advertised in the Cambridge newspapers, offering a reward of 10 guineas (£10.50) if he could be apprehended and placed in jail.

During 1791, when the Trustees were negotiating with John Rennie, they had asked him to assess an extension of the navigation from Stowmarket to the River Lark at Bury St Edmunds, but this was not pursued. With the navigation thriving, there were two proposals for canals from Ipswich to Eye, Suffolk in 1819. A meeting was held in January at Eye, which was chaired by Charles Cornwallis, 2nd Marquess Cornwallis. It considered two reports, one proposed by the civil engineer William Cubitt, which involved a tunnel through the hills at Mendlesham, with the estimated cost exceeding £100,000, and another, for a canal over the hills, costing £80,000. Both were thought to be too expensive to implement, but a third proposal emerged, for an extension from the River Gipping at Needham Market, which would follow the valley of a tributary through Creeting St Mary to Earl Stonham, where a basin would be built beside the turnpike road (now the A140 road). This would enable waggons to make a round trip from Eye in a single day, rather than the two days that a trip to Ipswich took. The scheme was estimated to cost £12,000, and shares in it were offered at the meeting. Although many were taken up, the scheme did not advance any further.

When the Eastern Union Railway announced plans for an extension from Ipswich to Stowmarket in 1844, the Trustees negotiated with the company to lease their canal. They hoped that this would be of benefit to the shareholders, and that it would help the railway by removing one source of opposition to their plans. They submitted a firm proposal for the lease on 8 February 1845, to which the railway agreed, and the shareholders sanctioned the action soon afterwards. They engaged a Parliamentary agent to handle the details, who realised that the original Act of Parliament, dating from 1790, expressly prohibited the Trustees from leasing the canal. By September, the two sides had agreed that each of them would seek to obtain powers to overturn the clause. The railway company would pay £1,070 per year for the first 21 years, and £850 per year for the second 21 years. The Trustees sought an Act of Parliament to authorise this, which contained a clause requiring the railway company to maintain the navigation. The House of Lords were not convinced that the clause was strong enough, and amended it to ensure that the railway had to maintain it "in as good a state and condition as the same shall be at the time of passing of the Act." With this amendment in place, the Act was passed on 26 June 1846.
Meanwhile, the railway company was obtaining its own Act, which had initially included a similar clause about maintenance, but this had been dropped by the time the Act was passed. The Railway Commissioners voiced their concern that the railway had somehow managed to gain control over a navigation without any of the details being included in their own Act. They raised the issue in their report to Parliament in 1847.
The line opened in 1846, and with it came a serious decline in traffic on the navigation. The condition of the waterway declined, and the Railway Commissioners asked the Great Eastern Railway who had taken over the Eastern Union Railway, to repair the defective sections in 1869. When the 42-year period of the lease was close to ending, the two sides met, and the railway declined to extend the lease. The navigation was by this time in a poor condition, with little traffic, but because of the clause in the 1846 Act, the railway company offered the Trustees £2,000 in lieu of repairs. This was agreed on 5 January 1888, and the money was paid on 23 March.

Trade on the upper part of the navigation to Stowmarket was extremely limited, with just an occasional barge carrying manure to Prentice's Manure Works, and returning with guncotton, which was manufactured at an explosives works. There was more traffic between Ipswich and Bramford, as barges regularly worked to Fison's and Packard's factories. The companies paid lower tolls because they helped to maintain the lock gates and clear weeds from the channel. 30-ton barges were worked through the lower four locks in trains of two dumb barges with a steam-powered barge pulling them. By 1917, the undertaking was virtually bankrupt. Income amounted to around £220 per year, with expenditure running at £480, and there was no capital left. The Trustees tried to make economies, but in May 1922, with the current account overdrawn, they resolved to close the navigation from 3 June 1922.

The Trustees met again in November 1930, and in 1932 resolved to formally close the navigation. The passing of the Land Drainage Act 1930 meant that they did not need to obtain an Act of Parliament to do so, and instead a closing order was obtained under section 41 of that Act. The Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries confirmed the order on 5 October 1932. A final meeting was held on 16 March 1934, when debts were settled, and the remaining money was split between East Suffolk County Council and the Catchment Board, who had responsibility for the river under the terms of the Land Drainage Act. All records were passed to the clerk of the Catchment Board, and the meeting closed with a vote of thanks to the Trustees' own clerk for his commitment over the years. The waterway gradually fell into decay.

In the wake of a report entitled "Upgrading of remainder waterways" by the Inland Waterways Amenity Advisory Council, which had been reconstituted by the government in the spring of 1974, the Eastern Region branch of the Inland Waterways Association (IWA) began to take an active role in the improvement of the River Gipping. This cause was highlighted by an article in the December 1979 edition of the waterways magazine "Waterways World", which showed the state of the navigation, and noted that the long-term aim of the local branch of the IWA was restoration to navigable standards for leisure traffic. Already the group had been clearing the towpath, and this led to the setting up of the "Gipping Valley River Path", a footpath from Ipswich to Stowmarket which uses the towpath for most of its route. Between 1994 and 2004, members of the IWA worked on the reconstruction of first Bosmere and then Creeting locks. Subsequently, the chamber of Baylham lock has been restored, although no gates have been fitted, and work has been carried out at Pipps Ford to restore a bridge over the tail of the lock and the river channel around the lock.

Claydon lock was destroyed when the A45 road was built. The river at this point was diverted through a new cut, and the site of the lock lies under the road, which has now become the A14 trunk road. Water levels on the river are regulated by various devices. Hawks Mill lock at Needham Market has had an automatic rising sluice gate fitted, while Paper Mill lock incorporates an automatic tilting sluice gate.

In 2007, the Inland Waterways Association decided that it would be better to set up a separate organisation to manage restoration of the navigation, and the River Gipping Trust was formed in May of that year. It is a private company limited by guarantee, and is registered at Companies House with company number 06145692. It is also registered as a charity.

The source of the River Gipping is in the village of Mendlesham Green. It rises to the north of the village, just above the contour, and is fed by waters drained from fields. It heads towards the south-west, passing under the main street of Mendlesham Green by Green Farm, a grade II listed timber-framed and plastered farmhouse dating from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It continues in the same general direction, passing Great Gipping Wood and Old Newton Hall, both on the north bank. The hall is a grade II* listed structure, dating from 1600 to 1630, with later additions. The joinery in one of the rooms in the left wing is exceptional. By Stonebridge Ford, the river is joined by a stream flowing northwards from Columbine Hall, a grade II* listed former manor house built of flint rubble around 1400, and another stream flowing southwards from Old Newton. By Bridge Farm, another timber-framed and plastered farmhouse dating from the late sixteenth century, Newton Bridge carries the B1113 road over the river, which then passes under a railway bridge, crosses the contour, and is joined by Haughley Watercourse, which flows southwards through Haughley and Dagworth.

The river now turns to the south east, and passes under the A14 Stowmarket Bypass to enter Stowmarket. It is crossed by Stowupland Street and Station Road, below which the river was made navigable. Immediately after Station Road bridge is The Maltings, originally a malthouse, but adapted as a warehouse to serve the navigation. The brick-built structure has nine openings on the ground floor, which once held chutes for loading barges, and two loading doors on the first floor. It is now used as a restaurant and leisure centre. The Gipping Valley River Path runs along the eastern bank of the river, which is flanked by industrial buildings. It is joined by the Rattlesden River, flowing from the west. Stowupland Lock was just below the junction, beyond which the river passes under the A1120 road bridge. Beyond the bridge, Badley Mill House is a seventeenth-century former mill-house. It has an eighteenth-century extension with a cellar dating from the early sixteenth century. The next bridge carries the railway over the river, and the site of Badley lock is close to Badley Mill Farm. The lock now acts as a weir. To the east of the lock is Creeting Hall, a mid-sixteenth-century manor house, with later additions, which is now divided into two dwellings.

The river is joined by the River Jordan on the east bank and Wattisham Watercourse on the west bank. To the east of Needham Market is Hawks Mill and Needham Lock. The lock is at the upstream end of the mill bypass channel. The present mill building was constructed in 1884. Although it still contains a working Armfield water turbine, all of the internal machinery has been removed. The road in front of it is supported by an eighteenth-century bridge. Just to the east are the remains of a post mill, originally built further north, but moved to its present location in 1880, and used as a dovecote. It is thought to be the last example of its type in the country. Needham Market sewage works is located on the east bank of the river, while to the west are some former gravel pits, which have been landscaped to become part of the Needham Lake park. The park spans the river, and parts of it are a designated local nature reserve. The river splits into two just to the north of the B1078 bridge, with the River Gipping to the east and the Old River to the west. Bosmere lock is located below the bridge, and the four-storey timber-framed and weatherboarded mill building is now used as a restaurant. The iron breast-shot water wheel remains, but the machinery does not. It was formerly called Barking Road Mill or Quinton's Mill, as there was a Bosmere Mill some further downstream.

The Gipping Valley River Path moves to the west bank at the bridge. The next lock downstream is Creetings Lock, with Riverside Farmhouse standing on the east bank. It was built in 1798 and was originally a mill house. The original Bosmere mill was close by, but was demolished in the early twentieth century. Coddenham Watercourse flowing west from Ashbocking through Coddenham joins the mill stream, and the Old River rejoins the main channel below that. Pipps Ford Lock came next, with Pipps Ford farmhouse, dating from the 16th and 17th centuries located to the east. The railway comes close to the river, and the Gipping Valley River Path briefly leaves the river, to run alongside the railway, but rejoins the towpath at Baylham Mill. The mill, close to a sixteenth-century mill house, was built in nineteenth century, and has three storeys with an attic storey containing storage bins. The cast iron breastshot waterwheel drove three pairs of stones through wooden shafting. Two additional pairs could either be water-powered, or an oil engine could drive them. Most of the machinery is still in situ, making it the only complete water mill on the river. There is a red-brick humped backed bridge over the tail of the adjacent lock, which was repaired with gault brick in the nineteenth century.
To the east of the river, both above and below the lock, is the site of Combretovium, known to have contained two Roman forts. Finds have included a bronze statuette of Nero and a saddle-cloth weight, which may indicate that cavalry was stationed there. After Shamford Lock, the river is crossed by the railway, with Blakenham Lock situated to the north of Great Blakenham. The Gipping Way reverts to the east bank at the lock, and nearby is a nineteenth-century house called Gipping Weir. The river and railway re-cross, and to the east of the river there are extensive flooded gravel workings. At the southern end of the workings, the site of Claydon lock now lies beneath the A14 dual carriageway. Continuing southwards, the next lock was Paper Mill Lock, beside which is the paper mill. To the west, but separated from the river by the railway, is Suffolk Water Park, which occupies flooded gravel workings. To the south is the north warehouse at Fisons Horticultural Division, which was built around 1858 to manufacture superphosphate fertiliser. To the south of the building, Edward Packard established the world's first superphosphate factory between 1851 and 1854, and the two companies amalgamated soon after Joseph Fison set up his rival enterprise in 1858. Somersham Watercouse flows around the western edge of the Suffolk Water Park, and joins the west bank.

After another crossing under the railway, the river skirts the eastern edge of Bramford and circles a hill, on top of which is Sproughton Manor, a grade II listed house built for Col Henry Phillipps in 1863 by the architect William Eden Nesfield. Sproughton Lock and mill are at the bottom of the hill. The mill is built in red brick and dates from the late eighteenth century. The mill race passes below the mill, which was operational until 1947, but all the machinery has been removed. Parts of the adjacent mill house date from around 1600. After passing under the A14 road, the river briefly heads north-east, through Chantry Cut, where Chantry Lock is situated, to pass under the railway. There are two bridges, as the railway line forks on the south side of the river. A flood barrier has been installed below the first bridge. Now passing through Ipswich, the river also forks, with the eastern branch being the River Gipping, and the western branch forming the start of the River Orwell. A modern sluice is located on the Orwell just below the junction. A final weir marks the position of Handford Sea Lock, below which the two channels rejoin. An outfall is situated below the junction, beyond which the river is tidal.

The Environment Agency measure the water quality of the river systems in England. Each is given an overall ecological status, which may be one of five levels: high, good, moderate, poor and bad. There are several components that are used to determine this, including biological status, which looks at the quantity and varieties of invertebrates, angiosperms and fish, and chemical status, which compares the concentrations of various chemicals against known safe concentrations. Chemical status is rated good or fail.

The water quality of the River Gipping system was as follows in 2016.
The reasons for the quality being less than good include sewage discharge affecting most of the river, physical modification of channels, ground water abstraction, and poor management of agricultural and rural land adjacent to the river system.

River Gipping

Claydon lock was destroyed when the A45 road was built. The river at this point was diverted through a new cut, and the site of the lock lies under the road, which has now become the A14 trunk road. Water levels on the river are regulated by various devices. Hawks Mill lock at Needham Market has had an automatic rising sluice gate fitted, while Paper Mill lock incorporates an automatic tilting sluice gate.

In 2007, the Inland Waterways Association decided that it would be better to set up a separate organisation to manage restoration of the navigation, and the River Gipping Trust was formed in May of that year. It is a private company limited by guarantee, and is registered at Companies House with company number 06145692. It is also registered as a charity.

The water quality of the River Gipping system was as follows in 2016.
The reasons for the quality being less than good include sewage discharge affecting most of the river, physical modification of channels, ground water abstraction, and poor management of agricultural and rural land adjacent to the river system.

River Gipping

Claydon lock was destroyed when the A45 road was built. The river at this point was diverted through a new cut, and the site of the lock lies under the road, which has now become the A14 trunk road. Water levels on the river are regulated by various devices. Hawks Mill lock at Needham Market has had an automatic rising sluice gate fitted, while Paper Mill lock incorporates an automatic tilting sluice gate.

In 2007, the Inland Waterways Association decided that it would be better to set up a separate organisation to manage restoration of the navigation, and the River Gipping Trust was formed in May of that year. It is a private company limited by guarantee, and is registered at Companies House with company number 06145692. It is also registered as a charity.

The water quality of the River Gipping system was as follows in 2016.
The reasons for the quality being less than good include sewage discharge affecting most of the river, physical modification of channels, ground water abstraction, and poor management of agricultural and rural land adjacent to the river system.


What is the oldest surviving theater in the world?

The Teatro all'antica ("Theater in the style of the ancients") is a theatre in Sabbioneta, northern Italy; it was the first free-standing, purpose-built theater in the modern world. The Teatro all'antica is the second-oldest surviving indoor theater in the world (after the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza), and is, along with that theater and the Teatro Farnese in Parma, one of only three Renaissance theaters still in existence.

Teatro all'antica

The theater was constructed in 1588 and 1590 by the celebrated Vicentine architect Vincenzo Scamozzi under a commission from Duke Vespasiano I Gonzaga, as part of Gonzaga's effort to turn his tiny Ducal seat into an idealized classical city. The importance that theater had come to hold, as a sign of the civilized society that the Duke was trying to create, is indicated by the prestigious location that was reserved for the theater in the principal street of the town, the Via Giulia, and by the fact that a separate building was erected to hold the theater. This prestige location had a cost, however, in the form of a cramped and narrow setting that could be successfully converted into a theater only by the considerable ingenuity of one of the Renaissance's most gifted architects.

The influence of the Teatro Olimpico upon the Teatro all'antica is evident in a number of features—most notably in the colonnade at the rear of the seating area and in the set designs. Such influences are to be expected; Scamozzi had overseen the construction of the Teatro Olimpico following the death of the great Andrea Palladio, who had laid out its original design. In particular, Scamozzi had been responsible for the remarkable perspectives which form the onstage scenery at the Teatro Olimpico.

However, the Teatro all'antica was a much different theater, in part because of the different building in which it was placed, and in part because Scamozzi had learned important lessons as a result of his labours at the earlier theater. The theater building is roughly three times as long as it is wide, whereas the space occupied by the Teatro Olimpico is approximately square. The longer, narrower structure of the theater building meant that Scamozzi was unable to build the seating area in the form of the semicircle that had been seen by Palladio as the ideal form for an audience, based on the model of ancient Roman theaters. Where the wide, shallow space available in the converted building that was used to house the Teatro Olimpico had forced Palladio to stretch the ideal semicircle into an ellipse, the opposite change was forced upon Scamozzi in Sabbioneta, and the seating area was transformed into a horseshoe.

As well, Scamozzi abandoned completely the elaborate and classically inspired scaenae frons that in many ways is the defining feature of the Teatro Olimpico. The removal of this rigid stage backdrop, which had forced him to build seven separate street scenes in order that all audience members could see at least one part of the scenery, made it possible to construct a single perspective view of a single street scene. Scamozzi's plans for this trompe l'oeil scenery are clearly visible in the upper-right corner of his plans for the theater. The illusion of great distance was achieved by rapidly diminishing the size of the false-front buildings over a compressed distance. As an integral part of the illusion, the floor level rose rapidly to allow the buildings to shrink vertically, and the two sides of the street closed in on each other sharply. These two features of the set design can be seen, respectively, on the upper right-hand side and lower right-hand side of Scamozzi's plans. Given the narrowness of the seating area, a single perspective was sufficient for all audience members.

In the 17th century, Scamozzi's original scenery was removed and replaced by a new system with sliding wings. However, his original plans—which are shown above—were preserved in the archives at the Uffizi in Florence, making it possible, in the twentieth century, for new scenery to be rebuilt based on the original plans and added to the theater.

One of the oldest surviving operating theaters is the Old Operating Theatre in London. Built in 1822, it is now a museum of surgical history. Another theater still exists at the University of Padua, in Italy, inside Palazzo Bo. It was commissioned by the anatomist Girolamo Fabrizio d'Acquapendente in 1594. Another famous operating theater is the Ether Dome in Boston. Built in 1824, it is now a conference room and tourist attraction. Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia also boasts its own surviving operating theater, built in 1804.

Operating theater

An operating theater (also known as a good room, operating suite, theatre (British English), operation suite or OR) is a facility within a hospital where surgical operations are carried out in an aseptic environment.

Historically, the term "operating theatre" referred to a non-sterile, tiered theater or amphitheater in which students and other spectators could watch surgeons perform surgery. Contemporary operating rooms are devoid of a theatre setting, making the term "operating theater" a misnomer. There are only two old-style operating theaters left, both of which are preserved as part of museums.

Operating rooms are spacious, easy to clean in a cleanroom, and well-lit, typically with overhead surgical lights, and may have viewing screens and monitors. Operating rooms are generally windowless and feature controlled temperature and humidity. Special air handlers filter the air and maintain a slightly elevated pressure. Electricity support has backup systems in case of a black-out. Rooms are supplied with wall suction, oxygen, and possibly other anesthetic gases. Key equipment consists of the operating table and the anesthesia cart. In addition, there are tables to set up instruments. There is storage space for common surgical supplies. There are containers for disposables. Outside the operating room is a dedicated scrubbing area that is used by surgeons, anesthetists, ODPs (operating department practitioners), and nurses prior to surgery. An operating room will have a map to enable the terminal cleaner to realign the operating table and equipment to the desired layout during cleaning.

Several operating rooms are part of the operating suite that forms a distinct section within a health-care facility. Besides the operating rooms and their wash rooms, it contains rooms for personnel to change, wash, and rest, preparation and recovery rooms(s), storage and cleaning facilities, offices, dedicated corridors, and possibly other supportive units. In larger facilities, the operating suite is climate- and air-controlled, and separated from other departments so that only authorized personnel have access.
People in the operating room wear PPE (personal protective equipment) to help prevent bacteria from infecting the surgical incision. This PPE includes the following:The surgeon may also wear special glasses that help him/her to see more clearly. The circulating nurse and anesthesiologist will not wear a gown in the OR because they are not a part of the sterile team. They must keep a distance of 12-16 inches from any sterile object, person, or field.

Early operating theatres in an educational setting have had raised tables or chairs at the center for performing operations surrounded by several rows of seats for students and other spectators to observe the case in progress. The surgeons wore street clothes with an apron to protect them from blood stains, and they operated bare-handed with unsterilized instruments and supplies.

In 1884 German surgeon Gustav Neuber implemented a comprehensive set of restrictions to ensure sterilization and aseptic operating conditions through the use of gowns, caps, and shoe covers, all of which were cleansed in his newly invented autoclave. In 1885 he designed and built a private hospital in the woods where the walls, floors and hands, arms and faces of staff were washed with mercuric chloride, instruments were made with flat surfaces and the shelving was easy-to-clean glass. Neuber also introduced separate operating theaters for infected and uninfected patients and the use of heated and filtered air in the theater to eliminate germs. In 1890 surgical gloves were introduced to the practice of medicine by William Halsted. Aseptic surgery was pioneered in the United States by Charles McBurney.

The Theatre of Dionysus Eleuthereus is a major theatre in Athens, considered to be the world's first theatre, built at the foot of the Athenian Acropolis. Dedicated to Dionysus, the god of plays and wine (among other things), the theatre could seat as many as 17,000 people with excellent acoustics, making it an ideal location for ancient Athens' biggest theatrical celebration, the Dionysia. It was the first theatre ever built, cut into the southern cliff face of the Acropolis, and supposedly the birthplace of Greek tragedy. The remains of a restored and redesigned Roman version can still be seen at the site today. It is sometimes confused with the later, smaller, and better-preserved Odeon of Herodes Atticus, located nearby on the southwest slope of the Acropolis.
The site has been used as a theatre since the sixth century BC. The existing structure dates back to the fourth century BC but it has had many other later remodellings.
On November 24, 2009 the Greek government announced that they would partially restore the Theatre of Dionysus.

Theatre of Dionysus

The site of the Theatre of Dionysus Eleuthereus, which is on the south slope of the Athenian Acropolis, has been known since the 1700s. The Greek Archaeological Society excavated the remains of the theatre beginning in 1476 and throughout most of the 19th century. Early remains in the area relating to the cult of Dionysus Eleuthereus have been dated to the 6th century BC, during the rule of Peisistratus and his successors, but a theatre was apparently not built on the site until a century later. The only certain evidence of this early theatre consists of a few stone blocks that were reused in the 100 century BC.

During the sixth century BC performances associated with the festivals of Dionysus were probably held in the Athenian agora, with spectators seated on wooden bleachers ("ikria") set up around a flat circular area, the "orchestra", until the "ikria" collapsed in the early fifth century BC, an event attested in ancient sources. After the collapse of the stands, the dramatic and musical contests were moved to the precinct of Dionysus on the slope of the Acropolis.
The early theatre must have been very simple, comprising a flat orchestra, with a few rows of wooden or stone benches set into the hill. The oldest orchestra in the theatre precinct is thought to have been square, although there is some debate as to its original size and shape. A wooden scene building ("skene") was apparently introduced at the back of the orchestra, serving for the display of artificial scenery and perhaps to enhance the acoustics. It was in this unpretentious setting that the plays of the great fifth century BC Attic tragedians were performed.

By the end of the fifth century BC, some of the wooden constructions had been replaced with stone. The Theatre of Dionysus in its present general state dates largely to the period of the Athenian statesman Lycurgus (ca. 390-325/4 BC), who, as overseer of the city's finances and building program, refurbished the theatre with stone in monumental form. The fourth century theatre had a permanent stage extending in front of the orchestra and a three-tiered seating area ("theatron") that stretched up the slope. The scene building had projecting wings at both ends ("paraskenia"), which might have accommodated stairways or movable scenery. According to Margarete Bieber, the earliest stone "skene" with remains surviving is that of the Theatre of Dionysus.

Alterations to the stage were made in the subsequent Hellenistic period, and 67 marble thrones were added around the periphery of the orchestra, inscribed with the names of the dignitaries that occupied them. The marble thrones that can be seen today in the theatre take the form of "klismos" chairs, and are thought to be Roman copies of earlier versions. At the center of this row of seats was a grand marble throne reserved for the priest of Dionysus.

The Theatre of Dionysus underwent a modernization in the Roman period, although the Greek theatre retained much of its integrity and general form. An entirely new stage was built in the first century CE, and was dedicated to Dionysus and the Roman emperor Nero. By this time, the floor of the orchestra had been paved with marble slabs, and new seats of honor were constructed around the edge of the orchestra. Late alterations carried out in the third century AD by the archon Phaedrus included the re-use of earlier Hadrianic reliefs, which were built into the front of the stage building. The remains of a restored and redesigned Roman version of the theatre can still be seen at the site today.
The theatre was dedicated to Dionysus, the god of wine and the patron of drama; it hosted the City Dionysia festival. Among those who competed were the dramatists of the classical era whose works have survived: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, and Menander. The advent of tragedy, in particular, is credited to the Athenians with festivals staged during specific times of year. These dramatic festivals were competitive among playwrights and involved the production of four plays, three tragedies and one satyr play featuring lighter themes. Early on, the subject matter of the four plays was often linked, with the three tragedies forming a trilogy, such as the Oresteia of Aeschylus. This famous trilogy ("Agamemnon", "Choephori", and "Eumenides") won the competition of 458 BC held in the Theatre of Dionysus Eleuthereus. The plays tell the story of the curse on the House of Atreus: Agamemnon’s murder by his wife, the revenge of their son, Orestes, upon his mother, and Orestes’ trial in Athens. :)

By the time of the Oresteia, dramatists would have had a "skene" and probably also a wheeled platform for special effects ("ekkyklema") and a lifting device ("mechane") available for their productions, as well as the use of a third actor. In the late fourth century exaggerated masks were worn and considered highly important for character identification to an audience consisting of thousands. It is assumed that earlier masks, such as those worn in plays by Aeschylus, were more modest in expression and size.

The Theatre of Dionysus also sometimes hosted meetings of the Athenian "Ekklesia" after the "Pnyx" was deemed unsuitable. In the Roman period, "crude Roman amusements" that were ordinarily restricted to the amphitheatre replaced the sacred performances once held in the theatre, and by the Byzantine period, the entire complex had been destroyed.