Walthamstow is not an area many would today associate with the production of fine wine. But as DANIEL BINNS discovered, that hasn't always been the case.

THE famous diaries of naval official and MP Samuel Pepys have informed much of what historians know about daily life in seventeenth century London.

As well as covering epoch-defining historical events such as the plague and the Great Fire of London, Pepys's everyday writings are packed full of fascinating small details and accounts of how his contemporaries lived.

One particularly intriguing account is his curious description on Wednesday, July 17, 1667 of a dinner party in which acclaimed wine from a vineyard in Walthamstow was served.

Pepys attended the event at the home of his friend and fellow naval official, Sir William Batten, who lived on a country estate in the area.

Pepys was full of praise for Sir Batten's drink, writing that "the whole company said they never drank better foreign wine [than this one] in their lives".

But the idea of luscious lines of grapes growing in what is now north east London would not have been unusual at the time.

Contemporary records show many noblemen experimented with wine production during the era, although the history of the practice in England stretches back much further.

The Domesday Book of England records that there were more than 40 vineyards in southern England at the time of the survey's completion in 1086, while there were thought to be more than 130 when King Henry VIII came to the throne in the sixteenth century.

However many of the details of Walthamstow's own vineyard remain a mystery.

Historians are still unsure exactly where Sir Batten lived and where his vineyard - assumed to be in his garden - was located.

Nonetheless, clues suggest his house might have been in the area around Walthamstow Market, which was then known as Marsh Street.

Sir Batten's wife remarried after his death - which happened just months after his Walthamstow wine dinner party - and her new husband Sir James Leyenberg is recorded as living in Marsh Street in 1676.

Today, wine production is experiencing something of a renaissance in England, although 21st century Walthamstow's lack of country estates or other areas of land that might be suitable suggests it is an industry that is unlikely to return to the area any time soon.