What is "zeriuani"

The Zeriuani or Zeruiani was a Slavic tribe mentioned by the 9th-century Bavarian Geographer . It states that the Zeriuani "which is so great a realm that from it, as their tradition relates, all the tribes of the Slavs are sprung and trace their origin" (Zeriuani tantum est reguum, utex eo cunctae gentes Sclavorum exortae sint, et originem, sicut affirmant, ducant).

It is considered that the name is written in contaminated form for the Severians. The name of the Serbs, which was considered by some older scholars, was never written with the Slavic suffix -jane (-eani), while the tribal name of the Severians was written in both collective Sever and plural Severjane form, etymologically implying Severian tribes. Gerard Labuda considered those tribes arrived from the Lesser Poland and western Ukraine, while Ryszard Kiersnowski assumed the Zeriuani were a relic of a large group which lived along the river Oder, but as there was no recorded tribe with such a name in those parts it also indicates the Ruthenian and Balkan Severians.