Thadden family

A miles (knight) Geroslaus (Jarislav) Taditz ("son of Thaddeus") was first mentioned in a 1334 register of the State of the Teutonic Order in the lands of the former Samboride dukes of Pomerelia at Danzig.

The family's ancestral seat was Tadden (present-day Tadzino in the Polish Pomeranian Voivodeship).

The dynasty's territory was part of Lauenburg and Bütow Land, which after the Order's defeat and the Second Peace of Thorn in 1466 was held by the Imperial Dukes of Pomerania as a Polish fief.

The seats of the second branch were Tadden-Enzow and Rybienke in the east of Lauenburg, but also in the adjacent Pomerelian lands of Puck: a first reference in 1469 mentions Peter Tadde, Lord of Rutzau (Rzucewo), other members called themselves Lords of Polchau (Połchowo) and Klanin (Kłanino).

In 1527 the Ribienke branch also received the fiefs of Dzinzelitz (Dzięcielec), Bonswitz (Bąsewice) and Reddestow (Redystowo) from the hands of the Pomeranian dukes.