Marie Laveau, American voodoo practitioner (died 1881)

Marie Catherine Laveau was a Louisiana Creole practitioner of Voodoo, an herbalist, and a midwife who was renowned in New Orleans. Her daughter, Marie Laveau II, also practiced rootwork, conjure, and Native American and African spiritualism, as well as Louisiana Voodoo and traditional Roman Catholicism. An alternate spelling of her name, Laveaux, is considered by historians to be from the original French spelling.

Louisiana Voodoo, also known as New Orleans Voodoo, was an African diasporic religion that existed in Louisiana and the broader Mississippi River valley between the 18th and early 20th centuries. It arose through a process of syncretism between the traditional religions of West and Central Africa, and Haitian Vodou. No central authority controlled Louisiana Voodoo, which was organized through autonomous groups.