Film star Johnny Depp's The Libertine grossed $2.2m on its release in North America earlier this year. The movie tells the story of John Wilmot, second Earl of Rochester, a courtier, wit and poet who lived a dissolute life as X-rated as his brilliant, licentious verse.

The scene of his most notorious escapades was the London of the Swinging Sixties the swinging 1660s, that is.

Restoration London formed the backdrop to a reckless career, which saw him feted as (in his own words) "the wildest and most fantastical odd man alive."

Rochester enjoyed much favour with Charles II, though his subversive wit more than once got him into trouble with his royal master. On one celebrated occasion Rochester delivered a mischievous impromptu verse: God bless our good and gracious King, Whose promise none relies on; Who never said a foolish thing, Nor ever did a wise one.

On that occasion, Charles II was in forgiving mood, and good-humouredly explained: "My words are my own, but my actions are my ministers."

Though London was the scene of his scandals, Rochester was an Oxfordshire man by birth and spent the quieter times of his life in the environs of his family estates.

Adderbury was one locale; his father Henry had been a staunch supporter of the Royalist cause during the English Civil War and had a manor there. However, Henry went into exile in France shortly after his marriage and the future poet was born on April 1, 1647, in his mother's manor house at Ditchley, described by diarist John Evelyn as a low ancient timber house with a pretty bowling green'. It was replaced in Georgian times by Ditchley Park, privately owned today but open to the public by appointment.

Rochester was educated at the Free School at Burford (or Barford, for the records are indistinct) where he reportedly acquired the Latin to such perfection, that to his dying-day he retained a great relish of the fineness and Beauty of that Tongue.' He went to Oxford at the age of 12, entering Wadham College, a noted centre of scientific rationalism under the Commonwealth, famously open-minded and hostile to religious dogma.

Wadham's Experimental Philosophical Club' would in 1660 become The Royal Society. It was also widely charged that the college's freethinking spirit corrupted the morals undergraduates, and its reputation for excess soon led Wadham to be dubbed Sodom'.

Though there are hints that Rochester had already begun drinking heavily at college he proved studious enough to receive his MA only 18 months after admission. And following a three-year tour of France and Italy he would be received at Court on Christmas Day, 1664: a graceful and well shaped person, tall and well made, if not a little too slender'.

This was the frolicsome age of Samuel Pepys and the orange-seller Nell Gwynne who rose to become a close friend of Rochester as well as the King's mistress. But even by the relaxed moral standards of the day, the Earl's escapades raised eyebrows. Besides writing his indecent verse, Rochester fought duels, had countless affairs and on one occasion abducted the rich and beautiful heiress, Elizabeth Malet, for which he was punished by a term of imprisonment in the Tower. Rochester would later marry Elizabeth whom he undoubtedly loved but he continued to misbehave No one doubted Rochester's intellectual gifts, nor indeed his courage. He saw naval service during the Dutch Wars of 1665 and 1666 where his outstanding bravery won him widespread praise. And despite his quarrels with the King, Rochester maintained the favour of Charles II who in 1675 appointed him Ranger of Woodstock Park (now Blenheim Park).

Besides acquiring a much-needed pension, Rochester also gained High Lodge, the official ranger's residence at Woodstock, which he used as a retreat from his mother and his long-suffering wife both living now at Adderbury. The building was a walled mansion that stood at the west end of the hunting forest, very secluded yet commanding wide views over the Oxfordshire countryside. It was here, in quietness, that he wrote some of his longer poems.

Despite increasing ill health, Rochester formed liaisons with a number of young ladies in the neighbourhood, particularly one Nell Browne of Woodstock, of whom it was written though she looked pretty well when clean, yet was a very nasty, ordinary, silly creature which made people much admire.' Rochester had the walls at High Lodge painted with lascivious murals, and he brought to his retreat wealthy rous like George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, who came often with his pack of hounds, for hunting and more dubious entertainments.

Rumours of scandalous goings-on were rife; two years after he moved in, the mad Earl Rochester' and his fellow rakes were reported to have been running naked races around the grounds. On this occasion, Rochester's defence has the ring of truth: so much is true: that we went into the river somewhat late in the year and had a frisk for forty yards in the meadow to dry ourselves.' For all such merriments, Rochester was succumbing increasingly to physical pain and a pervasive melancholy. Alcohol abuse no doubt played its part in his declining health. But there were other factors. In 1669 he had been infected with the pox and endured mercury treatment' at a Madame Fourcard's bathhouse in Leather Lane. Though it appeared to have vanished, it seems to have come back to haunt him, slowly destroying body and mind alike over the last ten years of his life.

Towards the end, sick of human vanity and increasingly neglecting his oldest friends, the unbeliever Rochester turned inward and brooded on metaphysical questions. He started to consult Gilbert Burnet, one-time chaplain to Charles II, on issues of religion. And as darkness gathered, with Burnet at hand, he made a celebrated deathbed repentance for his former wicked life, written for the benefit of all those whom I may have drawn into sin by my example and my encouragement.' He died in the moonless early hour of 26 July 1680.

With Rochester's rumoured insanity, there were sceptics who doubted the validity of the deathbed conversion, believing it was not made while of sound mind. For Christian writers, in contrast, Rochester's whole life has been interpreted as an allegory of sin and redemption. Whatever the truth, he did possess an underlying seriousness and was always recognised among fellow writers as an artist of real calibre. The French philosopher Voltaire would call him a man of genius, and a great poet', while William Hazlitt wrote that his epigrams were the bitterest, the least laboured, and the truest that were ever written.' On August 9, the Earl was buried beside his father in the vault under the north aisle of Spelsbury Church, not far from Chipping Norton, where it lies to this day.

Ditchley Park www.ditchley.co.uk is open by appointment: 01608 677346 info@ditchley.co.uk Spelsbury Church Tickets for The Oxford Waits' tribute to Lord Rochester are available by phone 01608 676088; or from Evenlode Books at Alder House, Market Street, Charlbury OX7 3PH.