William MacKay

William MacKay has been involved with numismatics for over 30 years, initially as a collector of British coins prior to joining the coin auction department of Spink, London, in 2007 as a specialist in British coins.

In this role he handled cataloguing of a number of key sales including the Glenister (2007, 2014), Myatt (2008), Magnus (2012), Commander Gerhardt (2012) and Ross Blakey I-III (2013) collections among others. His approach to clients seeks to combine scholarship with honest opinion.

In addition to his work in the auction business, he has published a number of papers in mainstream academic journals which focus on the mid-ninth century coinages of Wessex and Mercia. These include The Coinage of Aethelred I (2007) and The Lunettes Coinage of Alfred the Great (2008), which he co-authored, both published in the British Numismatic Journal (BNJ). Following on from these studies he is the author of, The Coinage of Burgred of Mercia 852-874 published in the same Journal in 2015 and is currently working on a study of the London Monogram coinage of Alfred the Great. In addition to these he has published a number of short articles on new coin types in the BNJ as well as in the Spink Numismatic Circular.

Whilst at Spink he authored a series of popular feature articles in the Spink house magazine under the heading, Historic British Coins, in which a coin was used to provide a window into historical events at the time it was struck. He serves on the editorial committee advising on updates and changes to the annually published Spink Standard Catalogue of British Coins.

William MacKay has a degree in history from Durham University. He is a member of the British Numismatic Society and the Royal Numismatic Society. In 2005 he was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. He also has Masters degree in Business Administration from Bradford University.