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An excerpt from www.HouseOfNames.com archives copyright © 2000 - 2016
Venice, one of the oldest and most beautiful island regions of Italy, is the esteemed birthplace of numerous prominent families, including the family that bears the surname Manzella. Although people were originally known only by a single name, it became necessary for people to adopt a second name to identify themselves as populations grew and travel became more frequent. The process of adopting fixed hereditary surnames was not complete until the modern era, but the use of hereditary family names in Italy began in the 10th and 11th centuries. Italian hereditary surnames were developed according to fairly general principles and they are characterized by a profusion of derivatives coined from given names. Although the most common type of family name found in Venice is the patronymic surname, which is derived from the father's givenname, names derived from occupations are also found. Occupational surnames, which are less common than other types of surnames in Italy, date back to the feudal era. However, under the Feudal System, occupational names did not become hereditary until the offices themselves became hereditary. It was only after an occupation was inherited by several generations in lineal descent that occupational names came to be applied to entire families, and so became a hereditary surname. The surname Manzella is a common occupational name for a person who raised steers having being derived from the Italian word Manzo, meaning steer. During the Middle Ages, Italian society was primarily based on agriculture and accordingly agricultural occupations were quite frequently shown in the development of these surnames.
The surname Manzella was first found in Friuli (Venetian: Friul), an area of northeastern Italy, with Patriarca di Aquileia Volserico Manzano in 1083.
There are many variations of most of those Italian names that originated in the medieval era. Some of these come from regional differences, like the tradition of ending northern names in "o" and southern names in "i". Others come from inaccuracies in the recording process, which were extremely common in the eras before dictionaries standardized spelling. Some of the spelling variations of Manzella are Manzo, Manzano, Manzoni, Manzonni, Manzonne, Mansone, Manzu, Manzuoli, Manzuolo, Manzi, Manzoli, Manzolo, Manzano, Manzelli, Manzina, Manzini and many more.
This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Manzella research. Another 21 words (2 lines of text) covering the years 1500, 1785 and 1860 are included under the topic Early Manzella History in all our PDF Extended History products.
Another 257 words (18 lines of text) are included under the topic Early Manzella Notables in all our PDF Extended History products.
An inquiry into the early roots of North American families reveals a number of immigrants bearing the name Manzella or a variant listed above:
Manzella Settlers in United States in the 20th Century
The Manzella Family Crest was acquired from the Houseofnames.com archives. The Manzella Family Crest was drawn according to heraldic standards based on published blazons. We generally include the oldest published family crest once associated with each surname.
This page was last modified on 16 November 2015 at 10:36.