Word.ws English Dictionary

civil parish

civil parish noun: in any of various countries, an administrative subdivision of an area, often of a county.

Noun

civil parish (plural civil parishes)

  1. In any of various countries, an administrative subdivision of an area, often of a county.
    Synonyms:
    parish[Appendix:Glossary
    1. A civil subdivision of a British county, often corresponding to an earlier ecclesiastical parish; a similar subdivision in Ireland.

Synonyms of civil parish

  • parish[Appendix:Glossary
  • CP

Forms of civil parish

pluralcivil parishes

Origin of civil parish

The word parish for a local area of church and/or government authority predates rigorous modern distinctions between ecclesiastical and civil affairs. The term civil parish uses intentional pleonasm, in a way that natural language sometimes does, to easily and efficiently ensure clarity through disambiguation. By the same underlying principle, the term ecclesiastical parish is retronymic.

Questions about civil parish

What does civil parish mean?
Civil parish means in any of various countries, an administrative subdivision of an area, often of a county.
What part of speech is civil parish?
Civil parish is a noun.
What is the plural of civil parish?
The plural of civil parish is civil parishes.

Words near civil parish in the dictionary

  1. civil liberty
  2. civil list
  3. civil lists
  4. civil marriage
  5. civil marriages
  6. civil parish
  7. civil parishes
  8. civil partner
  9. civil partners
  10. civil partnership
  11. civil partnerships

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: civil parish (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “civil parish.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/civil_parish. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.