In genealogy and family trees, how do you typically display maiden names? née, parentheses, hyphenation?

Question

I've seen it done with "née", parentheses, and with hyphenation. What's the most common way?

For example, if Jane Doe's maiden name was Smith, it might be displayed as:

Jane Doe, née Smith

Jane Doe née Smith

Jane Doe (Smith)

Jane Smith-Doe

Perhaps there are other ways too, with which I'm not familiar.

What is the most commonly accepted way to display the maiden name in genealogical research and in family trees and listings?

Answer 1

typically it's nee.

You can usually see these in obituaries and such but nee is the most common, hyphens and parentheses are a bit too confusing.

Sorry I don't have the accent

Answer 2

I use Family Tree Maker software, it displays the woman's full name as her first, middle, and maiden names only.  In a family tree, it should be very obvious if she married and if so, what his name was (or what their names were, if she married more than once).

Answer 3

Jane Smith, who married John Doe . . .

We record women under their maiden names, even if they marry Mr. Doe at age 14 and stay married until death do them part, 70 years later. Jane will have lived 14 years as Jane Smith and five times that long as Jane Doe, but she is still Jane Doe in a genealogy data base.

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Added later:

She will be Jane Doe or Jane Smith Doe in her death record, SSN application and obituary, and in the story about being honored as Mom of the year by the county PTA, but in a genealogy data base she will be Jane Smith.