The Manteuffel family is an old and influential German Pomeranian noble family, which later also resided in Brandenburg, Prussia, Silesia, Mecklenburg, Poland, the Baltics and in Russia.
The surname Manteuffel is a combination of the German words for a man of knightly condition (man) and devil (teufel). Originally it was a surname denoting a person inclined to violent and criminal acts.
Manteuffel family was first mentioned in 1256 in the person of John I Manteuffel, who was a landed lord of Taglim (Anklam) in the service of Duke Barnim I. His son Henricus Manduvel who is first mentioned on 14. November 1287 started the German line of the family, which was one of the oldest and most distinguished one in the region of Westphalia. On 10 March 1709 the family was raised to the title of Baron, while in 1719 they were raised to the hereditary title of Count. On 25 August 1790 the family received the title of Imperial Count from Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria as an Imperial vicar.
His second son, unknown by name, started the second Pomeranian line of the family, which divided into more than a dozen lines. Another line moved as late as the 13th century to what is now Estonia, then a Danish province. By the 17th century, they bore the surname Soie, Soye, Zoege, Zoge, Szoege or, in a polonized form, Sey. At the beginning of the 17th century, there was a realization of common ancestry with the Pomeranian Manteuffles and the adoption of the surname in the form of Manteuffel-Szoege. During the Polish-Swedish War, a representative of the family, Andrew Manteuffel-Szoege, entered Polish service, as a result of which he lost his estates in Estonia and settled in Courland. His descendants belonged to the Polish-Livonian nobility and by the 19th century had become completely Polonized.