BELLENDEN, WILLIAM, Scottish classical scholar (died after 1625). He lived in the reign of James I. (VI. of Scotland), who appointed him "master of requests." Bellenden lived at Paris, where he became professor at the university, and advocate in the parliament. In 16o5 was published anonymously his Ciceronis Princeps, a compilation of all Cicero's remarks on regal government, digested and systematically arranged. In 1612 there appeared a similar work on consular authority and the Roman senate, Ciceronis Consul, Senator, Senatusque Romanus.
His third work, De Statu Prisci Orbis (1615), is a good outline of general history. All three works were combined in a large volume, entitled De Statu Libri Tres (1615), which was first brought into due notice by Dr. Samuel Parr, who published an edition in 1787. The greatest of Bellenden's works is the treatise De Tribus Luminibus Romanorum, published posthumously at Paris in 1633. The book is unfinished, and treats only of the first luminary, Cicero ; the others intended were apparently Seneca and Pliny. It is said that nearly all the copies were lost on the passage to England. One is in the Cambridge university library.