[VILLIERS (Claude Deschamps de) or Jean DONNEAU DE VISÉ]. Les Costeaux ou les marquis frians. Comedie. Paris [Lyon], Thomas Jolly [Laurent Metton], 1665. Small in-12, green morocco, triple gilt fillet, spine decorated with petit fers, interior lace, gilt edges (C. Hardy). Extremely rare Lyon counterfeit, published in the same year as the Paris original. Alain Riffaud cites only one copy, in the Houghton Library at Harvard. The identity of the author of this play, performed on 10 January 1665 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne but published anonymously, is a matter of controversy: while theatre historians and bibliographers of the 18th and 19th centuries attributed it to Claude Deschamps, sieur de Villiers (1600?-1681), Peter William Shoemaker, in a recent critical edition, attributes it to Jean Donneau de Visé (1638-1710), as did Samuel Chappuzeau in 1674 in his Théâtre françois. "This play is a little course in the gastronomy of the time: we learn many particularities about table manners, including the names of Boucingo and Renier, the best suppliers of wines and liqueurs" (Soleinne). "There is an account of a complete dinner in the seventeenth century and many passages on the table, especially on wines," says Vicaire, who points out that the title of the play refers to the gourmets of the Ordre des Côteaux, the famous "society of drinkers responsible for tasting and appreciating the wines of all vintages" (Dinaux). A fine copy, finely bound by Hardy. Cited by Vicaire, it passed through the Lebeuf de Montgermont library (1876, no. 600) before appearing in a catalogue of the Librairie Auguste Fontaine (1877, no. 875). Vicaire, 215 (quoted copy) - Soleinne, I, n°1331 - Dinaux, I, 199-202 - Riffaud, n°6545.