[1] Jordanes simply called him "king of the Huns" (Latin: rex Hunnorum) and writes the story of Balamber crushing the tribes of the Ostrogoths in the 370s; somewhere between 370[2] and more probably 376[3] AD.

[4] He argues that the name is of uncertain meaning but "seems to have an eastern origin" and suggests a connection to a city in Central Asia called Balaam (Βαλαάμ).

[10] Jordanes recounts: "Balamber, king of the Huns, took advantage of his ill health to move an army into the country of the Ostrogoths, from whom the Visigoths had already separated because of some dispute.

Meanwhile Hermanaric, who was unable to endure either the pain of his wound or the inroads of the Huns, died full of days at the great age of one hundred and ten years.

[14] Cassiodorus, i.e. Jordanes recounts that after Ermanaric's death Goths separated in Western Visigoths and Eastern Ostrogoths, the latter remained in "their old Scythian settlements" under Hunnic rule.

The Amal Vinitharius retained the "insignia of his princely rank", and trying to escape from the Huns, he invaded the lands of the Antes and their king Boz for merely one year, but Balamber put an end to Ostrogoths independence.

[2] Wolfram argued that although scholars often identify "Vithimiris" with Vinitharius, and "Videric" with Vandalarius, onomatological and genealogical methods do not go along with historical events, and many difficulties arise.

[20] A number of scholars such as Edward Arthur Thompson, Hyun-Jin Kim, and Peter Heather consider Balamber's story historically improbable, and he may be a version of the better-attested Valamir,[6][7][4] or was an invention by the Goths to explain who defeated them.