Louisiana parish map

Why Louisiana has parishes

Under French and Spanish rule, Louisiana was administered through Roman Catholic church parishes, and when the Territory of Orleans was organised in 1807 its 19 civil divisions kept the name. The state has used “parish” ever since, and the parish seat, parish council or police jury, and parish sheriff correspond exactly to a county seat, county board and county sheriff elsewhere. The Census Bureau treats parishes as county equivalents.

The original 1807 parishes lie along the lower Mississippi and the bayous south of it: Orleans, St. Bernard, Plaquemines, St. Charles, St. John the Baptist, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Lafourche, Iberville, Pointe Coupee, West Baton Rouge, Concordia, Rapides, Natchitoches, Ouachita, Attakapas (now St. Martin, St. Mary and others) and Opelousas (now St. Landry). The north of the state, settled later from the hill South, has parishes with English-language names — Lincoln, Union, Jackson, Winn, Grant, Webster — while the south keeps French and Spanish saints’ names, and Acadia, Evangeline and Vermilion recall the Acadian settlers.

Louisiana lies entirely in the Central Time Zone. Two parishes have merged with their seats: Orleans Parish is coextensive with the city of New Orleans, and East Baton Rouge Parish and the city of Baton Rouge share a consolidated government. Lafayette Parish and the city of Lafayette also operate a combined government.

All 64 parishes of Louisiana

Five parish facts

• Largest by area: Plaquemines Parish, which follows the Mississippi River from just below New Orleans to its mouth at the Gulf. Counting water it covers about 2,400 square miles, most of it marsh and open bay; by land alone, Cameron Parish on the Texas line and Vernon Parish are comparable.
• Smallest by area: West Baton Rouge Parish, seat Port Allen, about 200 square miles on the west bank of the Mississippi opposite Baton Rouge. Orleans Parish is smaller by land but includes a large share of Lake Pontchartrain.
• Most populous: East Baton Rouge Parish, with about 457,000 people in 2020, edging out Jefferson Parish (about 440,000), the suburban parish that wraps around New Orleans. Orleans Parish, at about 384,000, has never recovered its pre-Hurricane Katrina population of nearly half a million.
• Least populous: Tensas Parish, seat St. Joseph, on the Mississippi in the north-east, with about 4,100 people. Cameron Parish, whose coast was struck by hurricanes Rita, Ike and Laura, is only slightly larger.
• Oldest and newest: The 1807 parishes of the Territory of Orleans are the oldest. The newest are Allen, Beauregard and Jefferson Davis, all carved from the enormous Imperial Calcasieu Parish in 1912–1913. Louisiana has no independent cities, but Orleans and New Orleans are one and the same, and Baton Rouge and Lafayette share governments with their parishes.

Reading the map

Press Streets and zoom in to see parish lines. The Mississippi River divides pairs of parishes on either bank: East and West Baton Rouge, East and West Feliciana, Iberville and Ascension. The Sabine River is the Texas line from Caddo Parish south to Cameron Parish. The coastal parishes — Cameron, Vermilion, Iberia, St. Mary, Terrebonne, Lafourche, Jefferson, Plaquemines and St. Bernard — face the Gulf of Mexico across a fringe of marsh that is steadily eroding. North of Lake Pontchartrain the “Florida Parishes” (St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Washington, St. Helena, Livingston and the two Felicianas) were part of Spanish West Florida until 1810 and were the last territory added to the state.

Related maps

• Louisiana map — cities, borders and geography.
• Blank Louisiana map and printable Louisiana map.
• Baton Rouge, the state capital; New Orleans, the largest city.
• Neighbouring county maps: Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas.
• West South Central states · the South · Gulf Coast · Central Time Zone.
• Geography: Mississippi River, Gulf of Mexico, US coastlines.
• All US county maps.