The Collaborative International Dictionary
Commandery \Com*mand"er*y\, n.; pl. Commanderies. [F. commanderie.]
The office or rank of a commander. [Obs.]
A district or a manor with lands and tenements appertaining thereto, under the control of a member of an order of knights who was called a commander; -- called also a preceptory.
An assembly or lodge of Knights Templars (so called) among the Freemasons. [U. S.]
A district under the administration of a military commander or governor. [R.]
--Brougham.
Wiktionary
a. preceptive n. A community of the Knights Templar, or the physical buildings or estate of such a community.
Usage examples of "preceptory".
As the Vatican closed in, the Priory smuggled their documents from a Paris preceptory by night onto Templar ships in La Rochelle.
It's only that I'm thinking of taking my family in that direction in the Long, and it occurred to me that, as very few of the English preceptories have ever been properly planned, I might have an opportunity of doing something useful on off-days.
If we were told that such a man, so honoured, and so honourable, suddenly casting away regard for his character, his vows, his brethren, and his prospects, had associated to himself a Jewish damsel, wandered in this lewd company through solitary places, defended her person in preference to his own, and, finally, was so utterly blinded and besotted by his folly, as to bring her even to one of our own Preceptories, what should we say but that the noble knight was possessed by some evil demon, or influenced by some wicked spell?
The words shall scarce have left thy lips, ere thou wilt either be an hundred feet under ground, in the dungeon of the Preceptory, to abide trial as a recreant knight.