Balamber (also known as Balamir, Balamur and many other variants) was ostensibly a chieftain of the Huns, mentioned by Jordanes in his Getica (c. 550 AD). 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 and more probably 376 AD.

A number of historians argue that Balamber may have never existed, and was a confusion of other rulers or even a fabrication.

The name is recorded in three variants by Jordanes, and an additional two by copyists: Balaber, Balamber, Balamur, Balambyr, Balamir. Balaber, with omission of -m-, may be a corruption of Balamber. Balamir has the Gothic onomastic suffix -mir/-mer.

Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen argued that the original form of the name was Balimber and that its meaning is unknown.

Omeljan Pritsak considered Balamur as the only original Hunnic form of the name. He derived it from a word akin to Mongolian balamut, balamud, balamad (savage, wild, venturous, daring). Pristak thus reconstructs the name as coming from bala + mur, meaning "the greatest among the venturous, daring".

Hyun Jin Kim argues that the name is simply a corruption of the name Valamir, who he argues to have been the basis of the figure in Jordanes. Kim notes that Valamir was written Βαλαμηρ (Balamêr) in Greek. 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).

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. The fact of his death enabled the Huns to prevail over those Goths who, as we have said, dwelt in the East and were called Ostrogoths."