The parish and civil registers in Paris are documents containing records that officially establish the lineage of individuals born, baptized, married, divorced, deceased, or buried in Paris , within its administratively variable boundaries over time.
Since the 16th century, the capital has maintained an exceptional quantity of parish registers due to its size and the high number of parishes. Directories accompany the collection. In May , during the Commune , most of Paris' archives [ fr ] , including its civil records , suffered a major disaster : deliberate fires almost destroyed the parish registers from the 16th century to and the civil registers from to , despite being stored at two different sites.
The flames obliterated nearly 11, registers containing over 8 million documents in a few hours. This resulted in a vast and permanent gap, making historical and genealogical research in Paris particularly challenging today.
In agenda format and written in Latin , it covers the period from April to November The first burial registers, from Saint-Josse and Saint-Landry [ fr ] , date back to A record in the form of proof of baptisms shall be made, containing the time and hour of birth. An extract from this register may be used to prove the age of majority or minority and will serve as full legal evidence for this purpose.
Before this legal requirement, fifteen Parisian parishes already kept baptismal registers, three kept marriage registers, and one kept burial registers. Presided over by Pope Paul III from to , the Council of Trent also required priests to keep a register of baptisms performed in their parish. The names of godparents had to be included to prevent marriages between people linked by spiritual kinship e.
