Maximilian Frederick was a son of Count Albert Eusebius of Königsegg-Rothenfels, a small County of southern Swabia. He attended the Jesuit schools in Altötting, Cologne, and Strasbourg. He became a member of the Cathedral of Cologne in 1725, and from 1731 became a member of the Cathedral of Strasbourg and the Canon of St. Geron in Cologne.