Quote Originally Posted by RedKnight
Nelson, thanks for that tip - it makes a lot of sense. I know where I'm gonna park my boats a little while!

But Spencer - did that port have a library, like Nelson said? Try building a bireme in that same port. Or a quinqereme elsewhere. (I just started a new game so I'd be hard put to do either.)
Yes, it's possible that the scriptorium or even the ludus magna makes the difference since I've never built a quinqereme in a city without one. I'll look and see later, but I'm pretty sure I've built a few biremes in cities with at least scriptorium and they were not admirals (but then not every quinqereme is either).