Editing List of parishes in Louisiana (section)

==History==
[[Louisiana]] was formed from French and Spanish colonies, which were both officially [[Roman Catholic]]. Local colonial government was based upon [[parish]]es, as the local ecclesiastical division.

Following the [[Louisiana Purchase]], the territorial legislative council in April 1805 divided the [[Territory of Orleans]] (the predecessor of Louisiana state) into [[#Territorial counties|12 counties]]. The borders of these counties were poorly defined, but largely coincided with the colonial ecclesiastical parishes.<ref name=chronologies/><ref name="Bryansite">{{cite web|url=http://www.bryansite.com/countyLA.htm|title=Bryansite - Louisiana parishes|last=Tabor|first=B.}}</ref>

On March 31, 1807, the territorial legislature created 19 parishes without abolishing any of the old counties (which term continued to exist until 1845). In 1811, a constitutional convention was held to prepare for Louisiana's admission into the [[United States|Union]].<ref>[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/America/United_States/Louisiana/_Texts/LHQ/1/4/Admission_to_the_Union*.html The Admission of Louisiana into the Union]</ref> This organized the state into seven judicial districts, each consisting of groups of parishes. In 1816, the first official map of the state used the term ''parish'', as did the 1845 constitution. Since then, the official term for Louisiana's primary civil divisions has been ''parishes''.

The 19 original parishes were joined by Catahoula Parish in 1808. In 1810 [[Florida Parishes|four additional parishes]] were created from the formerly [[Spanish West Florida]] territory—these are part of what is now referred to as the [[Florida Parishes]].

By April 1812, [[Attakapas County, Orleans Territory|Attakapas Parish]] became St. Martin Parish and St. Mary Parish. On April 30, the state was admitted to the Union with 25 parishes.

By 1820, Washington Parish was added, and [[Feliciana Parish, Louisiana|Feliciana Parish]] split into West and East in 1824. The next year, [[Jefferson Parish, Louisiana| Jefferson Parish]] was carved from Orleans Parish. By 1830, Claiborne Parish was created, and the old [[Warren Parish, Louisiana|Warren Parish]] was mostly absorbed into Ouachita Parish, only to return as [[Carroll Parish, Louisiana|Carroll Parish]] a few years later.

In 1838, Caddo Parish was created from Natchitoches, as were Madison and Caldwell parishes in the east. In 1839, Union Parish was formed from Ouachita, and Calcasieu was formed from St. Landry in 1840.

Five parishes were created in 1843: Bossier, DeSoto, Franklin, Sabine, and Tensas. Morehouse Parish and Vermilion Parish were formed from Ouachita and Lafayette parishes, respectively, in 1844. The next year, Jackson Parish was formed, the old county units were abandoned, and the units were officially referred to as "parishes". In 1848, Bienville Parish was formed from Claiborne Parish. In 1852, Winn Parish was formed, while parishes further south added and lost land.

In 1853, Lafourche Interior Parish was renamed to Lafourche Parish. During [[Reconstruction Era|Reconstruction]], state government created a number of new parishes, with the first being Iberia and Richland parishes. Plans for creating a parish like Iberia from St. Martin and St. Mary parishes had dated from the 1840s. (A surveying error in Iberia's creation broke [[St. Martin Parish]] into two non-contiguous parts, making it and [[Norfolk County, Massachusetts]] as the only county-level units with their own [[exclaves]].) Tangipahoa and Grant parishes followed in 1869. In 1870, the fifth Reconstruction parish, Cameron, was created, which was followed by the sixth, seventh, and eighth parishes (Red River, Vernon, and Webster, respectively) in 1871. The ninth parish to be formed under Radical Republican rule was Lincoln, named after the late president and formed in 1873. In 1877, the old parish of Carroll divided into East and West Carroll parishes, which are unofficially called the tenth and eleventh Reconstruction parishes, as the project ended that year.

No new parishes were formed until 1886, when Acadia Parish was formed from St. Landry. Again, no new parishes were formed, this time until 1908, when the western half of Catahoula parish became LaSalle parish.

In 1910, the parish count rose to 61 with the creation of Evangeline Parish, and the 62nd, 63rd, and 64th parishes (Allen, Beauregard, and Jefferson Davis) were created from areas of Calcasieu Parish. There were several minor boundary changes afterward, the most substantial being the division of [[Lake Pontchartrain]] among Tangipahoa, St. Tammany, Orleans, Jefferson, St. John the Baptist, and St. Charles Parishes in 1979.