I started playing a new game again after a long break. I set the game for 8 other nations, 24 CS, and the barbarian civilization. Normally when I play it's either me or a nation that are the leaders for scientific advances, and by the time I get railroads I'm usually in the lead. The game though it's the barbarians that are ahead of everyone, and it's not just a tech or two. He clearly has artillery and infantry units while everyone else has crossbows. I just recently got the ability to build frigates, but seeing how advanced he is on land I know it's only going to be a couple dozen turns or so at best before he's pumping out battleships. I know it's not the difficulty setting. That's set to chieftain. Nor can it be through research agreements since he always declares war on everyone right after meeting them. I'd like to know the following:

1: Is there a setting somewhere I can change to slow down how fast he advances technologically? I'm not looking to stop him, just put him in line with everyone else. I kind of find it ridiculous that they should be so far ahead of everyone like that.

2: How is he getting that far ahead in the first place? I've never seen the AI outpace everyone like that. I know on the higher difficulties they gain tech faster than the player. I've also seen some nations lag behind on tech compared to everyone else. But I haven't seen any game where one nation gets that far ahead on tech that early in the game (well at least not since Civ 4 where I could do that pretty regularly). I don't think it's a mod conflict since I've had the same mods for awhile now and I don't recall the barbarians doing that before.