This book provides an examination of the Hospitaller manor at Kilmainham in Dublin as it existed under Roger Outlaw. As prior of the Knights Hospitallers and chancellor of Ireland for almost twenty years a major factor in his political survival was his use of the corrody or pension system. Against a background of war, famine, feuding and treachery a picture emerges of the way in which a socio-economic construct such as the corrody could be used to support an exceptionally successful career and create a unique community.