Aki the Wealthy

Aki the Wealthy plays a small but important role in Egil's Saga.^[1] While raiding with his band of vikings in Courland Egil and his 12 of his men are captured in a clever ambush by a farmer's son and kept in a wooden stronghold overnight to be tortured and interrogated the following day. Egil frees himself and his crew and then while searching for an escape they come across a trap door to a pit from which they hear voices coming from. Three Danish captives are released from the pit who happen to be Aki and his two sons. Aki informs Egil of an escape route and informs him of booty to be plundered from the farmers land. Egil and his men help Aki and his sons escape, whereupon they return to their farms and wealth in Jutland.

The following spring Egil and his men go raiding in Denmark, around the same time that Eyvind Braggart has been banished from Norway and hired by King Harald Gormsson to defend the shores of Denmark. One night, Aki the Wealthy sends messengers to Egil to warn him that Eyvind has an ambush prepared for them on their return route. Thanks to Aki's warning, Egil and his men are able to sneak up on Eyvind's ships and kill many of his men and drive the rest away. Egil then gains both of Eyvinds ships as his prize.

References

1. Smiley, Jane (1997). The Sagas of the Icelanders. Iceland: Leifer Eiriksson Publishing.