Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana

Avoyelles (French: Paroisse des Avoyelles) is a parish located in the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2010 census, the population was 42,073. The parish seat is Marksville. The parish was created in 1807, with the name deriving from the French name for the historic Avoyel people, one of the local Indian tribes at the time of European encounter.

Today the parish is the base of the federally recognized Tunica-Biloxi Indian Tribe, who have a reservation there. The tribe also has a land-based gambling casino; it is located in Marksville, the parish seat, which is partly within reservation land.

History

Avoyelles Parish is known for its French-speaking history, with Creole traditions in both music and food, which reflect European, African and Native American influences. While having a distinctive history of immigrants directly from Europe, it is considered the most northern of the 22 "Acadiana" parishes,(with the parishes to the south settled by exiles from Acadia). They contributed strongly to the development of Cajun culture in this area, as did Africans and Native Americans. The parish is noted for its brand of Cajun music and its gumbo, a popular soup in this area with roots in the three major ethnicities noted above.