E. De Felice notes that this surname arose as the fixing as a surname of jocular, disparaging or polemical nicknames, formed from màngia, a deverbal of the verb mangiare ("to eat"). This form represents in large part the shortened hypocoristic of the frequent compounds in mangia-. The verb may take on both the literal sense of voracity and figurative meanings: "to eat at another's expense", "to take advantage", "to steal" or "to oppress".

E. Rossoni places the surname mainly in the Salento area —that is, the southernmost zone of the region of Puglia, in southern Italy—, with a presence also in the region of Campania. Rossoni further proposes a second hypothesis: that the surname may derive from the medieval name Mangia, of which a documentary testimony exists in Florence, where a deed of 1281 mentions a certain Mangia di Donato dei Minutoli, which indicates the circulation of this name as a given name before its possible fixing as a surname.

Both authors agree that the origin in a jocular nickname constitutes a plausible path of formation for this surname.