The authors agree that this surname derives from the name of biblical tradition Sansone, which corresponds to the judge of the people of Israel and hero of the war against the Philistines, a popular symbol of exceptional strength. The name was documented from the Middle Ages: Sansonius in Latin, Sansone already as a surname in Savona in 1168, Sanson in Padua in 1158, and Sanzonio in Venice in the 17th century.

E. De Felice explains that the name goes back, through the Latin Samson and the Greek Sampsόn / Samsόn, to the Hebrew Šimšōn, derived from šemeš ("sun") with the diminutive suffix -ōn, with the meaning of "little sun"; or alternatively from šāmēn, "the strong one." The variant Sansonetto was consolidated through the popularity of the homonymous character —in Old French Sansonnet— of the French epic-chivalric poems.

As to the geographic distribution, De Felice notes that Sansone or Sanzone and Sansonetti are proper to southern Italy with medium frequency; Sansoni is rare and sporadic in the centre-north; Sanson is characteristic of the north-east of Italy, in the regions of Veneto, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Trentino-Alto Adige; and Sanzonio or Sanzogno is predominantly Venetan.