What is the meaning of nee after maiden name?

Answer 1

The use of "nee" is after a woman's married name. It is derived from French for "born" and following it in the phrase is the woman's maiden name - the name she was born with.

Answer 2

According to the Webster's Collegiate English Dictionary, it's spelled, "nee."

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CORRECTION: It is hard for me to believe that Webster's could get this wrong for these reasons.(a) The word is spelled née (f.) or né (m.) (b) The accent can ONLY be omitted in limited (obsolete) circumstances. (c) It is a respected dictionary. (d) Unusually for an English word, its spelling is regulated (albeit by "foreigners"). (e) The online edition of the same company's collegiate dictionary spells it correctly.

I am curious why the original requester didn't just go to that dictionary link above.

Here's more than anyone would ever want to know about the word.

née (used with a woman's name), né (used with a man's name) - Adjective.French.

It means "born" as in the name someone was born with. It is almost always used to introduce a woman's original maiden surname following her married surname. In its basic meaning it is interchangeable with the English word born. For example: Hilary Clinton (née Rodham) is equivalent to Hilary Clinton (born Rodham) except for the following consideration:

The sole purpose of its original introduction into English usage (around 1750) was to convey class (at least a perception of it), suggesting that the lady might be descended from the originally French-speaking nobility in England, the land-owner class of Norman descent. That's why it retains French rules for grammar and spelling.

The acute accent on the first 'e' is not optional (see [2] and [3]). The second 'e' is the feminine form and is only for use with a female name. In all other cases (male, mixed genders or unknown gender) it is spelled né. Examples:

• Normal usage: Princess Diana of Wales (néeSpencer)
• Rarely used for men (note the spelling of the masculine form):

  Former boxer Muhammed Ali (né Cassius Clay)

Notes.

[1] The spelling of this and all other french words is the official mandate of l'Académie française - sometimes called the language police. Their entry for né/née dates it back to the tenth century.

[2] Obviously you can't include the accent if it is not possible, such as older computers and/or software that used 7-bit ASCII encoding (1980s and earlier). The accent is not optional when available because in some cases, omitting the accent can change the meaning (see below). More importantly, its original purpose in English was to "look French". Removing the accent would also remove the need for this word in the English language, as its precise English translation "born" would then suffice.

[3] Omitting the acute accent from the masculine form changes the word to another French word (ne) that is used to negate meaning, in effect stating that the man's name is/was NOT his birth name.