Tina Knowles-Lawson: ‘A lot of people don’t know’ Beyoncé is my maiden name

Tina Knowles-Lawson says that the Beyoncé surname got changed due to a clerical error

Sep 17, 2020

Tina Knowles-Lawson shared a fun tidbit about the origin of Beyoncé‘s name that even some die-hard fans weren’t previously aware of.

Tuesday, during the premiere episode of the In My Head with Heather Thomson podcast, the fashion designer and businesswoman shared that “Beyoncé” is actually her maiden name even though it will now forever be associated with her super famous daughter Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter.

Celebrities At The 67th NBA All-Star Game: Team LeBron Vs. Team Stephen — LOS ANGELES, CA – FEBRUARY 18: Beyonce, Blue Ivy Carter, Tina Knowles and Richard Lawson attend The 67th NBA All-Star Game: Team LeBron Vs. Team Stephen at Staples Center on February 18, 2018 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Allen Berezovsky/Getty Images)

“A lot of people don’t know that Beyoncé is my last name. It’s my maiden name,” explained the 66-year-old matriarch. “My name was Celestine Beyoncé, which at that time was not a cool thing to have that weird name. I wanted my name to be Linda Smith because those were the cool names.”

Several of her family members still have Beyoncé as their last names, although due to clerical error, her brother, his children and a few other people in her bloodline now have “Beyincé” as their surname.

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – FEBRUARY 20: Tina Knowles attend the Eddie Murphy X ARTUS Gallery Exhibition Opening Night at East Angel Gallery on February 20, 2020 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images)

“I think me and my brother Skip were the only two that had B-E-Y-O-N-C-E,” she said. “It’s interesting — and it shows you the times — because we asked my mother when I was grown. I was like, ‘Why is my brother’s name spelled B-E-Y-I-N-C-E? You know, it’s all these different spellings,’ ”

“And my mom’s reply to me was like, ‘That’s what they put on your birth certificate.’ “

“So I said, ‘Well, why didn’t you argue and make them correct it?’ ” she continued. “And she said, ‘I did one time. The first time, and I was told be happy that you’re getting a birth certificate because, at one time, Black people didn’t get birth certificates.”

Now that she’s a mother and grandmother herself, Knowles-Lawson says she can imagine it “must’ve been horrible” for her mother to “not to even be able to have her children’s names spelled correctly.” Noting, “So we all have different spellings. People don’t even put the two together and know that’s the same name.”

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