Suppose Jane Smith, a never-married woman, changes her name legally to Jane Johnson. She then marries William Miller and elects to become Mrs. Jane Johnson Miller.
Does she have a “maiden name”? If so, is it Smith (her last name at birth), or Johnson (the last name she had right before getting married for the first time)? That is, if one of her children is asked “What is your mother’s maiden name?”, would they be expected to say “Smith” or “Johnson”?
IMO her maiden name is Johnson but her birth name is Smith.
She *changed * her last name, so yes, her maiden name is Johnson.
I agree. A woman’s maiden name is the name she has before she takes her husband’s name on marriage - in this case, Johnson.
If I am born as Smith, then marry Jones but do not change my name, then change my name to Jones, then get divorced but keep the name Jones, then marry Brown but do not change my name, what is my maiden name? I would say Smith.
And for various insurance forms, etc that ask for maiden name – why are they asking? Do they want to know the previous surname or the birth name? I always though they wanted the birth name so they could look you up in public records.
In other words – I would say it’s the surname before ANY marriage, not just before the most recent marriage.
It’s your surname before you first adopt your husband’s surname. In the example you give, Smith is your maiden name before you adopt Jones, but Jones is not your maiden name before you adopt Brown.
I suspect insurers, etc, that ask for your maiden name are not so much interested in linking you to your birth certificate - they usually ask for your birth certificate anyway, don’t they? - as in linking you to any transactions (and defaults) you engaged in before you adopted your married name. Thus it’s not your birth name they want, but (if different) the name you used as an unmarried adult.
And this is why we all need to be assigned a unique 30-digit number at birth.
I don’t think there is any legal definition of “maiden name”. For general purposes I would pick what your name was right before you were married, assuming you change your name when you get married.
As others have said, if you have had several names in your lifetime, you should find out why people are asking for the other names and give them the appropriate one: birth name if someone is trying to find a birth record, name(s) used as an adult if someone is looking up credit information, any underworld aliases like “Two-Ton Tony” if you’re talking to your parole office, etc.
I really, really don’t want to meet any woman who went by “Two-Ton Tony” before she was married.
How about Two Ton Tessie from Tennessee? She sounds like she’d have been fun to know.
In the UK at least, your maiden name is legally the one you had just prior to marriage.
My wife and I lived together and had 2 kids before we finally got married. Before the first one was born she changed her surname to mine so everything would match on the birth certificates.
When we went to sort out our wedding she tried to give her birth name as her maiden name but was corrected quite aggressively by the over officious and very scary Registrar.