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The name at birth is the name a child is given by his or her parents, according to a generally universal custom, and legal requirement^[1] to file a form of birth certificate. What happens subsequently about this name has a substantial cultural component.

Where births are officially registered, a name entered into a birth certificate may by that fact alone become a legal name. The assumption in the Western world is often that the name from birth (given name plus family name at least), or perhaps from baptism, persists to adulthood in the normal course of affairs, with some possible changes (such as concerning middle names, uses of diminutive forms, adoption, choice of surname if parents divorce or were not married). Matters are very different in some cultures where a name at birth is only a childhood name, rather than the default choice for later life.

Birth name is a term now sometimes used for maiden name (name before marriage of a woman, in cultures where a married woman's name customarily changes), by those who find maiden name to be an old-fashioned usage with the wrong connotations. By extension to men, birth name or now sometimes birthname can mean name at birth, or possibly (and less precisely) the more elusive concept of real name (i.e. name before taking a professional name such as stage name, pen name, ring name, or an assumed name/alias name/nickname, or some recognised name change process which de jure alters names).

[edit] Notes

1. ^ [1], Canadian legal requirement.