[Gratien DU PONT]. Les Controverses des Sexes Masculin et Femenin. In-folio, camel morocco, triple fillet, 5-nerved spine decorated with gilt fillets, interior lace, gilt edges (Bauzonnet). Bechtel 251/D-428 // Brunet, II-251 // Fairfax Murray, 133 // USTC, 12870. (24f.)-CLXXIXf.-(1f.) badly paginated / C-CCC8, a-c8, d6 (+1f.), e8 (+1f.), f-x8, y6-z6 / 38 or 39 lines, sometimes on 2 columns, gothic car. / 174 x 247 mm. A rare first edition of this work in favour of male authority and against liberated women. Gratien Du Pont, sieur de Drusac, was a poet from the first half of the sixteenth century who lived in Toulouse, where he was lieutenant-general of the seneschaussée and a member of parliament. He died before 1545. The publication of Controverses des sexes masculin et féminin was apparently inspired by his painful separation from his wife. This deeply misogynistic work attempts to denigrate women. In the first book, the author doubts that women, like men, were created in the image of God. In the second, he advises against marriage. In the third, he recounts historical cases from sacred and secular authors, poems, epistles and ballads in which women appear in the wrong roles or reveal their vices or crimes, all good arguments for establishing male authority. It is the only work composed by Gratien Du Pont and it was not the poetic quality of its author, which Viollet-Le-Duc described as mediocre, that made it famous, but the controversy it provoked between supporters of male authority and those of female emancipation. Among those who spoke out against the work were Symphorien Champier, Charles Fontaine, Charles de Sainte-Marthe, Arnault de Laborie and, above all, Étienne Dolet, against whom Du Pont obtained a ban from the Toulouse parliament, prohibiting Dolet from entering the city of Toulouse. The work is curiously illustrated. It has a title with an architectural frame, portico, columns, pediment and putti, in the middle of which is a second engraving with the motto Loqui ad mensuram optimum: "For a better measure". This framing is repeated six times in the volume, with either text (1) or engravings (5) in the middle, depicting: the author asleep in a landscape inspired by an old man symbolising the male sex; a convoy carrying Dame Fortune; an army on the march; a gathering of women who have come to attack the author and defend Cupid, etc. A final large woodcut depicts a chessboard with the names of the women's vices distributed among the squares. The illustration is completed by 6 small vignettes depicting attackers leading a group of widowed or married people, young and gaunt, and several very old muguetteurs, as well as numerous initials and the printer's mark on the last page. Finally, there is a curious acrostic on folio L1 onwards, which reads the proverb Femme folle est et follie et toujours folliera. The collation of this edition is very complex as there are errors in the foliation and in the signatures. The copy is complete with all the leaves and the additional leaves (pages 26/27 and 31/34). A fine copy despite a stain on the second board and the title a little short of margins. Old handwritten inscription on the title partly faded, violet ink stains affecting the lower margin of several leaves over 2 to 3 mm high and 1 mm wide. Provenance: Henri Bordes (ex-libris, his Catalogue d'un choix de livres faisant partie de la bibliothèque d'un amateur bordelais, 1872, no. 153, not in the 1911 sale).