né

née, né

Née is the feminine form of the French adjective meaning ‘born’ and is traditionally used to identify the maiden name of a married woman: Mrs Ann Smith, née Jones. In other cases it is used to denote the original name of a woman who has changed her name; in this use it also appears in the masculine form né to refer to a man who has done this and even to non-human name changes: Diana Dors, née Diana Mary Fluck / Norman Charles, né Charles Norman Diggs / The Morning Star, né Daily Worker.