The Norwegian merchant Ottar (Ohthere) related for king Alfred the Great that he had passed the North Cape and after several days' voyage he arrived at a great river, the Dvina. At the estuary of the Dvina, dwelt the Beormas, who unlike the nomadic Sami peoples were sedentary, and their land was rich and populous. Ottar did not know their language but he said that it resembled the language of the Samis (Finno-ugric). The Biarmians told Ottar about their coun ...
The name appears in old Norse literature, possible for the area where Arkhangelsk is presently situated, and where it was preceded by a Biarmian merchant town. The first appearance of the name is in the Voyage of Ohthere, which was undertaken ca 890. According to the story, it was not the first Scandinavian voyage to the Biarmians, and it was explicitly undertaken to purchase walrus tusks from the Biarmians. Biarmland is also used later, maybe not the same Biarmland, both by the German historian Adam of Bremen (ca. 11th c.) and the Icelander Snorri Sturluson (1179-1241) in Herrauðs (Herraudhs) and Bosa sag ...
