The French and English-adopted née is the feminine past participle of naître, which means "to be born".
[2] The term née, having feminine grammatical gender, can be used to denote a woman's surname at birth that has been replaced or changed.
In most English-speaking cultures, it is specifically applied to a woman's maiden name after her surname has changed due to marriage.
[4] The diacritic mark (the acute accent) over the e is considered significant to its spelling, and ultimately its meaning, but is sometimes omitted.
[4] According to Oxford University's Dictionary of Modern English Usage, the terms are typically placed after the current surname (e.g., "Margaret Thatcher, née Roberts" or "Bill Clinton, né Blythe").