Arrondissements of Paris
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Arrondissements_of_Paris".

Arrondissement of Paris
Administration
Country	France
Region	Île-de-France
Department	Paris
Cantons	20
Communes	1
Préfecture	Paris
Statistics
Land area¹	105 km²
Population
- 1999	2,125,246
- Density	20240/km²
Location
¹ French Land Register data, which exclude lakes, ponds, and glaciers larger than 1 km² (0.386 sq. mi. or 247 acres) as well as the estuaries of rivers.

The city of Paris is divided into 20 arrondissements municipaux, more simply referred to as arrondissements (pronounced /əˈɹɒndɨsmənt/ in English and /aʁɔ̃dismɑ̃/ in French). These are not to be confused with departmental arrondissements, which subdivide the 100 French départements. The word "arrondissement", when applied to Paris, refers almost always to the municipal arrondissements listed below. The number of the arrondissement is indicated by the last two digits in Parisian postal codes (75001 up to 75020).

Description

The 20 arrondissements are arranged in the form of a clockwise spiral, starting with the 1st in the middle of the city on the right bank (north bank) of the Seine River. The French cities of Lyon and Marseille are also subdivided in this way.

The list below indicates Right Bank (R) or Left Bank (L) bank:

Notes:
1. With the Bois de Vincennes
2. Without the Bois de Vincennes
3. With the Bois de Boulogne
4. Without the Bois de Boulogne
5. 2005 is the year of the most recent official estimate; population of these arrondissements may still be growing

Each arrondissement is subdivided administratively into four quartiers. Paris thus has 80 quartiers administratifs, each containing a police station. For a table giving the names of the 80 quartiers, see fr:Quartier de Paris#Quartiers administratifs aujourd'hui.

History

Before 1860

Map showing the 12 old arrondissements. The surrounding grey area shows the size of Paris after the expansion in 1860.

On October 11, 1795, Paris was divided into 12 arrondissements. They were numbered from west to east, with numbers 1-9 situated on the right bank of the Seine, and 10-12 on the left bank.

Each arrondissement was subdivided into 4 quartiers, which corresponded to the 48 original districts created in 1790.

After 1860

On January 1, 1860, new territory was defined to be within the city by Napoleon III. The previous 12 arrondissements were rearranged with this new territory to become the present 20.

In references to historical records (where it is important to distinguish between the old and new systems), the old arrondissements are indicated by following the number with the term ancienne (e.g. 2ème ancienne or 7ème anc.).

See also

• Arrondissement, for other uses of the term.
• Paris districts
• Paris, je t'aime, movie composed of five-minute sequences on each arrondissement

External links

• Official Paris website
• Diagrams of each arrondissement showing its quartiers administratifs