Bellenden

Bellenden (BALLANTYNE), JOHN, of Moray, a Scottish writer in the reigns of James V. and Queen Mary, was born towards the close of the 15th century, and in 1508 matriculated at St Andrews as 'of the Lothian nation.' He completed his education at Paris, where he took the degree of D.D. at the Sorbonne. Bellenden is best remembered by his translation of Boece's Historia gentis Scotorum, and of the first five books of Livy (both done in 1533), interesting as specimens of the Scottish prose of that period, and remarkable for the ease and vigour of their style. To each of these works are prefixed poetical prohemes or prologues. Bellenden's Croniklis of Scotland professes to be a translation of Boece, but it is a very free one, and contains numerous passages not to be found in the original, so that it is in some respects to be considered almost an original work. The author enjoyed great favour for a long time at the court of James, at whose request he executed the translations. As the reward of his performances, he received grants of considerable value from the treasury, and afterwards was made archdeacon of Moray and canon of Ross. Becoming involved, however, in ecclesiastical controversy, he left his country, and, according to Bale and Dempster, went to Rome, where he died about 1550, or as late as 1587. The 'traductionn' of Livy was first published in 1822 by Mr Thomas Maitland (afterwards Lord Dundrennan), uniform with his edition of the Croniklis in the previous year.