Everyone knows Beyonce as the only Beyonce. But why is that? Beyonce’s mother, Tina Knowles-Lawson, has explained the origin of the singer’s unique and French-sounding name.
Speaking during Tuesday’s inaugural episode of In My Head with Heather Thomson podcast, Tina said that Beyoncé is actually her maiden name and it is a name that has been used in the family for generations as a surname.
Tina told the show’s host, “A lot of people don’t know that Beyoncé is my last name. It’s my maiden name.”
She continued, “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.”
Tina added that her brother and his children have Beyonce as their surname due to a ‘clerical error’. She said, “I think me and my brother Skip were the only two that had B-E-Y-O-N-C-E.”
So the reason Beyonce Knowles is such a unique name is because it is made up of two last names!
Beyonce’s mother is a Creole woman (French, African, and Native American descent) from Louisiana. She married Matthew Knowles in 1980, divorced him in 2011, and married actor Richard Lawson in 2015.