"Heart of the East End." a Stepney Travel Page by planxty

It is actually quite difficult to define the boundaries of Stepney, although I am sure there is some government Department who could tell you. Having lived in the general area for over 20 years now, I was always told that is it the area roughly bounded by Commercial Road, the Regents Canal, Mile End Road and Sidney Street.

As I have stated lsewhere on my pages, I am trying to split up my London pages into the various districts that they are relevant to but the VT system, much as I love it, causes problems with this so if my tips are not strictly speaking in the area mentioned, please be patient with me. For example, VT will recognise Stepney but not Limehouse, Highbury but not Islington etc. I have tried to put the tips as close geographically as the system will allow.

The name Stepney probably comes from Stebba's Hythe (a hythe being a landing place) in Saxon language, although Roman remains have also been found in the area. Certainly by the year 1000AD the Bishop of london owned the manor of Stepney which was then a much larger area than it is now and it features in the famous Domesday Book of 1086.

There were several periods of expansion thoughout the centuries and by the 20th century the area was a very busy and cosmopolitan industrial suburb. This cosmopolitan nature exists to this day with immigrant communities very prominent here.

The area was largely rendered wasteland by the German Blitz in the Second World War, and had to be substantially rebuilt in the post war period. Since 1965 it has been part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets.

One of my favourite quirky little pieces of information about Stepney is that it features in the lyric of a rolling Stones song. without going to your search engine, can you remember which one it is?