over 60 british medieval mazers are known to survive. many of the english survivals were preserved in oxbridge colleges, livery companies, hospitals and other institutions going back to the middle ages. relatively few have been passed down in wealthy families, though all such at the time would have owned them; the bute mazer is an exception here. a mazer still belonging to all souls college, oxford, but on loan to the ashmolean museum, was donated to the college in 1437, at the time of its foundation by thomas ballard, a landowner in kent.