The chewing louse genusColpocephalumparasitizes nearly a dozen distantly related orders of birds. Such a broad host distribution is relatively unusual in lice. However, the monophyly of the genusColpocephalumhas never been tested using molecular characters. Using one nuclear and one mitochondrial gene, we inferred a phylogeny for 54 lice from the genusColpocephalumand other morphologically similar genera. The resulting phylogeny demonstrates thatColpocephalumitself is not monophyletic. However, these data support the existence of aColpocephalumcomplex within which several lineages are restricted to particular host orders. These lineages corresponded to previously described genera, some of which are morphologically distinct and currently considered subgenera. Maddison–Slatkin tests were performed on the resulting phylogeny and showed that host order, host family and biogeographic region had significant phylogenetic signal when mapped onto theColpocephalumcomplex phylogeny. APARAFITanalysis comparing the overallColpocephalumcomplex phylogeny to a host phylogeny revealed significant congruence between host and parasite trees. We also compared the cophylogenetic history ofColpocephalumand their hosts to that of a second distantly related feather louse genus,Degeeriella, which also infests diurnal birds of prey. UsingPARAFITto identify individual host–parasite links that contributed to overall congruence, there was no evidence of correlated cophylogenetic patterns between these two louse groups, suggesting that their host distribution patterns have been shaped by different evolutionary processes.