Tina Knowles-Lawson has opened up about the origin of her daughter Beyoncé’s name.
The fashion designer and businesswoman, 66, spoke about the unique name during Tuesday’s inaugural episode of In My Head with Heather Thomson podcast.
Tina said “Beyoncé” is actually her maiden name even though it’s now widely associated with her famous daughter.
She said: “A lot of people don’t know that Beyoncé is my last name. It’s my maiden name. 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.”
The matriarch, who is mum to singer Solange, went on to say that several people in her family have the “Beyoncé” surname.
Due to clerical errors, others – such as her brother and his children – now have “Beyincé” as their surname.
“I think me and my brother Skip were the only two that had B-E-Y-O-N-C-E,” she said, before explaining why some family members spell the name differently.
“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,’ ” Knowles-Lawson said. “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?’ ” Tina 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.”
Knowles-Lawson added that it “must’ve been horrible” for her own mother to “not to even be able to have her children’s names spelled correctly.”
“So we all have different spellings,” she said. “People don’t even put the two together and know that’s the same name.”
