(French.) To cheat. Villon was a poet in the reign of Louis
XI., but more famous for his cheats and villainies than for his verses.
Hence the word villoner, “to cheat, to play a rogue's trick.” (Rabelais: Pantagruel, iv. 17; note by Molleux.)
Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894