Iberia

Iberia, officially the Republic of Iberia, is a country located at the southern tip of Western Europa. It is a federal constitutional semi-presidential republic consisting of 31 regions, 3 autonomous territories and 1 federal city.

Its mainland is bordered to the south and east by the Mediterranean Sea except for a small land boundary with Gibraltar; to the north by Germania; and to the northeast by the Italian Republic and Switzerland. It is one of two countries to have both Atlantic and Mediterranean coastlines, the other being Numidia.

Iberia is a multi-ethnic society encompassing a wide variety of cultures, languages, and religions. Its pluralistic makeup is reflected in the constitution's recognition of 12 official languages, which is among the highest number of any country in Kobol.

Etymology
The Iberian Peninsula has always been associated with the Ebro River, Ibēros in ancient Thracian and Ibērus or Hibērus in Latin. The association was so well known it was hardly necessary to state; for example, Ibēria was the country "this side of the Ibērus" in Strabo. Pliny goes so far as to assert that the Thracians had called "the whole of Catalonia" Hiberia because of the Hiberus River. The river appears in the Ebro Treaty of 226 BC between Rome and Carthage, setting the limit of Carthaginian interest at the Ebro. The fullest description of the treaty, stated in Appian, uses Ibērus. With reference to this border, Polybius states that the "native name" is Ibēr, apparently the original word, stripped of its Thracian or Latin -os or -us termination.

The early range of these natives, stated by the geographers and historians to be from southern Andaluzia to southern Occitania along the Mediterranean coast, is marked by instances of a readable script expressing a yet unknown language, dubbed "Iberian." Whether this was the native name or was given to them by the Thracians for their residence on the Ebro remains unknown. Credence in Polybius imposes certain limitations on etymologizing: if the language remains unknown, the meanings of the words, including Iber, must remain unknown also. In modern Basque the word ibar means 'valley' or 'watered meadow', while ibai means 'river', but there is no proof relating the etymology of the Ebro River with these Basque names.

Federating units
Iberia is a federation composed of 31 provinces, 1 federal city and 3 territories. In turn, these may be grouped into four main regions: Northern Iberia, Mediterranean Iberia, Atlantic Iberia, and Central Iberia. Provinces have responsibility for social programs such as health care, education, and welfare. Together, the provinces collect more revenue than the federal government, an almost unique structure among federations in the world. Using its spending powers, the federal government can initiate federal policies in provincial areas; the provinces can opt out of these, but rarely do so in practice. Equalization payments are made by the federal government to ensure that reasonably uniform standards of services and taxation are kept between the richer and poorer provinces.