The administrative boundaries of civil parish councils in England. The ONS provides this data for the purposes of producing statistics.

This research project aimed to fill a major lacuna militating against the effective exploitation of many post-medieval to mid-Victorian historical sources collected by local administrative areas: the lack of information on the boundaries of those administrative areas, the so-called 'historic' or 'ancient' parishes of England and Wales. It is known that these districts came into being during the Middle Ages, that the map of these ecclesiastical parishes was essentially complete by the fifteenth century, that these ecclesiastical boundaries were adopted during the early modern period for secular and judicial purposes, and that boundaries remained essentially unchanged until a number of reforms from the mid-nineteenth century onwards reorganised the local administrative geography of the country. The project aimed to reconstruct those boundaries as they were before the post-nineteenth century changes.

In the middle of 2001 Roger Kain and Richard Oliver, from the University of Exeter, published a substantial work entitled Historic Parishes of England and Wales: Electronic Map - Gazetteer- Metadata. This was the final product of a project aimed at locating and mapping the boundaries of parish and sub-parish units of the mid-nineteenth century. The authors published the results in a series of electronic maps supplied on CD-ROM. Each one of these 115 maps contain a scanned 1”:1 mile OS New Popular Series map, overlain by the boundaries. A reference number can be found in each of the polygons that can then be used to look up information about that parish in gazetteer in an accompanying book.

A major limitation of this work is that although the boundaries are in digital form, they are divided into 115 tiles, none of which have any spatial co-ordinate information inherent in them. This means that although the maps are invaluable as a reference tool, they can not be used together within a GIS to select, analyse and present historic information.

We have therefore created a single digital map of the boundaries to provide a single, continuous coverage of polygons, each of which contain the information provided by Kain and Oliver in their accompanying book. This information includes the parish name, Ancient County, and a reference number that coincides with entries for that parish in the 1851 census report.

It is recommended that users also order disc 1 of study 4348; Historic Parishes of England and Wales : an Electronic Map of Boundaries before 1850 with a Gazetteer and Metadata

Please note: this study does not include information on named individuals and would therefore not be useful for personal family history research.

This file contains names and codes for the parishes and communities in England and Wales as at 31st December 2021. (File Size - 379 KB)Field Names - PAR21CD, PAR21NM, PAR21NMW, LAD21CD, LAD21NM, FIDField Types - Text, Text, Text, Text, TextField Lengths - 9, 66, 42, 9, 35FID = The FID, or Feature ID is created by the publication process when the names and codes / lookup products are published to the Open Geography portal. File updated to include changes to 3 parishes in North Northamptonshire following the late receipt of The Borough Council of Wellingborough (Reorganisation of Community Governance) Order 2019

INDEX VILLARIS: or, An Alphabetical Table of all the cities, market-towns, parishes, villages, and private seats in England and Wales was first published by John Adams in 1680. This dataset consists of a transcription of all 24,000 place-names listed in Index Villaris, together with the the symbols representing Adams's categorisation of each place and modern versions of the place-names and the counties and administrative hundred in which they lie or lay. It also comprises a transcription of the latitude and longitude recorded by Adams, and another set of coordinates generated by the application of a thin plate spline transformation calculated by matching some 2,000 place-names to the accurately-georeferenced CAMPOP Towns dataset.

The dataset is being checked, corrected, and refined to include linkage to other geospatial references such as OpenStreetMap and Wikidata, and will in due course be made available in the Linked Places Format.

The parish (from Latin 'Paroecia') is probably one of the most recognisable 'old' administrative boundary that many people are familiar with. The parish has always been associated with the administration of church and other ecclesiastical matters. The implementation of parishes as we would understand them today where imported into Wales by the Normans after the 1081. However many agree that there was likely a pre-existing system of church administration prior to the arrival of the Normans which may have been reused or provided a solid foundation for the Anglo-French system. It is from 12th century onwards that a comprehensive picture emerges. Ecclesiastical taxation records in 1254 and 1291 preserve parish names and many of these have continued up to the present day, albeit with some boundary changes.Ecclesiastical parishes were the main unit for tithe and Poor law payments, but by the late nineteenth century the Poor Law Amendment Act 1866 facilitated the need for the creation of 'Civic Parishes' which became the main administrative unit. In many instances these were based on the same boundaries as the ecclesiastical parishes, but changes were made to reflect the needs of growing urbanisation and populations rather than ecclesiastical requirements. The civil parishes where replaced in 1974 following the implementation of the Local Government Act 1972. This would see the civil parishes replaced by 'Communities' which are still in use today, although boundaries and names frequently continue to change. This dataset was created in Esri ArcPro 3.2.1 and reflects the historical hundred boundaries as recorded on the 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey 6" to the Mile County Series Mapping surveyed for Wales between 1888 and 1913.

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes and Non Civil Parished Areas, in England and Wales, as at December 2023.The boundaries available are: (BFC) Full resolution - clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

REST URL of Feature Access Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFC/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFC/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFC/MapServer

Data identifying the location of all the parishes in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. For more information, please see the ONS Geoportal website. If data is used, please acknowledge the copyright and the source of the data by including the following attribution statements:

Contains National Statistics data © Crown copyright and database right (2016)

Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right (2016)

For further details on licencing go to: https://certificates.theodi.org/en/datasets/620/certificate

Source: ONS Geoportal

All data is correct as of download date: 17/10/2016

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes and Non Civil Parished Areas in England and Wales as at December 2022.The boundaries available are: (BSC) Super Generalised (200m) - clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.REST URL of Feature Access Service –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BSC_V3/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BSC_V3/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BSC_V3/MapServer

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes in England and Wales, as at May 2023.The boundaries available are: (BGC) Generalised (20m) - clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

REST URL of Feature Access Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_May_2023_Boundaries_EW_BGC/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_May_2023_Boundaries_EW_BGC/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_May_2023_Boundaries_EW_BGC/MapServer

Important Note: This item is in mature support as of November 2021 and will be retired. A NEW VERSION of this item is available for your use. We recommend updating your maps and apps to use the new version.Boundary-Line is a specialist 1:10 000 scale boundaries dataset. It contains all levels of electoral and administrative boundaries, from district, wards and civil parishes (or communities) up to parliamentary, assembly and European constituencies. The currency of this data is 10/2019.

The coverage of the map service is GB. The map projection is British National Grid. The service is appropriate for viewing down to a scale of approximately 1:20,000. Updated by Esri UK: 22/01/2020To download this dataset use the link here.Ever wondered how Boundary-Line data could be used in analysis? Take a look at our police or supermarket story map.

This dataset is intended for researchers, students, and policy makers for reference and mapping purposes, and may be used for basic applications such as viewing, querying, and map output production, or to provide a basemap to support graphical overlays and analysis with other spatial data.

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes in England and Wales, as at May 2024.The boundaries available are:(BFE) Full resolution - extent of the realm (usually this is the Mean Low Water mark but in some cases boundaries extend beyond this to include off shore islands).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.REST URL of Feature Access Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_May_2024_Boundaries_EW_BFE/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_May_2024_Boundaries_EW_BFE/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_May_2024_Boundaries_EW_BFE/MapServer

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes and Non Civil Parished Areas, in England and Wales, as at December 2023.The boundaries available are: (BFE) Full resolution - extent of the realm (usually this is the Mean Low Water mark but in some cases boundaries extend beyond this to include off shore islands).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

REST URL of Feature Access Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFE/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFE/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2023_Boundaries_EW_BFE/MapServer

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes and Non Civil Parished Areas in England and Wales as at December 2022.The boundaries available are: (BFC) Full resolution - clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.REST URL of Feature Access Service –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BFC_V3/FeatureServerREST URL of WFS Server –https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BFC_V3/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Map Server –https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_and_Non_Civil_Parished_Areas_December_2022_EW_BFC_V3/MapServer

This dataset is intended for researchers, students, and policy makers for reference and mapping purposes, and may be used for basic applications such as viewing, querying, and map output production, or to provide a basemap to support graphical overlays and analysis with other spatial data.

This GIS shapefile provides boundary and attribute data for the parishes and places enumerated in the 1851 census for England and Wales. These data derive from the 173 digital maps of the boundaries of English and Welsh parishes and their subdivisions produced to a very high standard by Roger Kain and Richard Oliver in 2001, which was expertly converted into a single GIS of some 28000 polygons by Burton et al in 2004. However, what they produced was not yet ready for the mapping of census data due to a modest number (<10%) of administrative units which either lacked boundaries, were unlocated, had labelling errors, or incorrect census numbers. The Occupational Structure of Britain c.1379-1911 research programme undertook the task of enhancing the Burton et al. GIS to provide a comprehensive shapefile of parish and places as listed in the 1851 and 1831 censuses for the mapping of demographic and occupational data with tolerable accuracy for the whole of England and Wales. To this end it was also decided to add additional attributes concerning counties, hundreds and boroughs in 1831, counties in 1851 and registration sub-districts, districts and counties in 1851 from which shapefiles of these different larger scale administrative units could be assembled.

These data were created as part of a research program directed by Leigh Shaw-Taylor and Tony Wrigley, which aims ultimately to reconstruct the evolution of the occupational structure of Britain from the late medieval period down to the early twentieth century.

ArcGIS shapefile of 3,316 polygons providing boundary and attribute data for the 2182 registration subdistricts of England and Wales as given in the 1851 census. These data derive from the 173 digital maps of the boundaries of English and Welsh parishes and their subdivisions produced by Roger Kain and Richard Oliver based on the listing in the 1851 census.

These data were created as part of a research program directed by Leigh Shaw-Taylor and Tony Wrigley, which aims ultimately to reconstruct the evolution of the occupational structure of Britain from the late medieval period down to the early twentieth century.

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Parishes in England and Wales as at December 2021.The boundaries available are: (BSC) boundaries are Super Generalised (200m) - clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark).Contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.REST URL of ArcGIS for INSPIRE View Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_(December_2021)_EW_BSC/MapServerREST URL of ArcGIS for INSPIRE Feature DownloadService – https://dservices1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/services/Parishes_December_2021_EW_BSC/WFSServer?service=wfs&request=getcapabilitiesREST URL of Feature Access Service – https://services1.arcgis.com/ESMARspQHYMw9BZ9/arcgis/rest/services/Parishes_December_2021_EW_BSC_2022/FeatureServer

The 1885 UK parliamentary constituencies for Ireland were re-created in 2017 as part of a conference paper delivered at the Southern Irish Loyalism in Context conference at Maynooth University. The intial map only included the territory of the Irish Free State and was created by Martin Charlton and Jack Kavanagh. The remaining six counties of Ulster were completed by Eoin McLaughlin in 2018-19, the combined result is a GIS map of all the parliamentary constituecies across the island of Ireland for the period 1885-1918. The map is available in both ESRI Shapefile format and as a GeoPackage (GPKG). The methodology for creating the constituencies is outlined in detail below.

Methodology

A map showing the outlines of the 1855 – 1918 Constituency boundaries can be found on page 401 of Parliamentary Elections in Ireland, 1801-1922 (Dublin, 1978) by Brian Walker. This forms the basis for the creation of a set of digital boundaries which can then be used in a GIS. The general workflow involves allocating an 1885 Constituency identifier to each of the 309 Electoral Divisions present in the boundaries made available for the 2011 Census of Population data release by CSO. The ED boundaries are available in ‘shapefile’ format (a de facto standard for spatial data transfer). Once a Constituency identifier has been given to each ED, the GIS operation known as ‘dissolve’ is used to remove the boundaries between EDs in the same Constituency. To begin with Walker’s map was scanned at 1200 dots per inch in JPEG form. A scanned map cannot be linked to other spatial data without undergoing a process known as georeferencing. The CSO boundaries are available with spatial coordinates in the Irish National Grid system. The goal of georeferencing is to produce a rectified version of the map together with a world file. Rectification refers to the process of recomputing the pixel positions in the scanned map so that they are oriented with the ING coordinate system; the world file contains the extent in both the east-west and north-south directions of each pixel (in metres) and the coordinates of the most north-westerly pixel in the rectified image.

Georeferencing involves the identification of Ground Control Points – these are locations on the scanned map for which the spatial coordinates in ING are known. The Georeferencing option in ArcGIS 10.4 makes this a reasonably pain free task. For this map 36 GCPs were required for a local spline transformation. The Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 provides the legal basis for the constituencies to be used for future elections in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Part III of the Seventh Schedule of the Act defines the Constituencies in terms of Baronies, Parishes (and part Parishes) and Townlands for Ireland. Part III of the Sixth Schedule provides definitions for the Boroughs of Belfast and Dublin.

The CSO boundary collection also includes a shapefile of Barony boundaries. This makes it possible code a barony in two ways: (i) allocated completely to a Division or (ii) split between two Divisions. For the first type, the code is just the division name, and for the second the code includes both (or more) division names. Allocation of these names to the data in the ED shapefile is accomplished by a spatial join operation. Recoding the areas in the split Baronies is done interactively using the GIS software’s editing option. EDs or groups of EDs can be selected on the screen, and the correct Division code updated in the attribute table. There are a handful of cases where an ED is split between divisions, so a simple ‘majority’ rule was used for the allocation. As the maps are to be used at mainly for displaying data at the national level, a misallocation is unlikely to be noticed. The final set of boundaries was created using the dissolve operation mentioned earlier. There were a dozen ED that had initially escaped being allocated a code, but these were quickly updated. Similarly, a few of the EDs in the split divisions had been overlooked; again updating was painless. This meant that the dissolve had to be run a few more times before all the errors have been corrected.

For the Northern Ireland districts, a slightly different methodology was deployed which involved linking parishes and townlands along side baronies, using open data sources from the OSM Townlands.ie project and OpenData NI.