What is Black Sea Region?

What is the similarity between Spanish Iberia and the country Albania with the ancient Kingdoms of Iberia and Albania in the Black Sea region?

• Answer:

  Only the names.  Some suggest some real connection between the two places called Iberia, but that is unlikely.  A similarity of names is a very spurious basis.  Linguistic coincidences are quite common.  However, the connection cannot be definitively disproven. Spanish Iberia derives from the name of the river Ebro.  Etymology of the Caucasian Iberia is lost in the mists of time. Albania incorporates a common word element, used in many places.  There are the Alban Hills in Italy." Alban" was also used to refer to things Scottish, deriving from the Gaelic name for Scots. The word element "alba" or some version of it is an old one occurring in numerous ancient languages.  It usually referred to the color white.  In some languages it was used for pearl barley, a white grain.  The word element might also be present in the name of the river Elbe. In ancient times Albania (the region of the modern nation) was called Illyria, after the people who lived there.  A tribe of that people was called the Albani, which might or might not be the ultimate source of the modern name.   The kingdom organized by Pyrrhus was named Epirus.