Bellenden had family connections with the royal court and literature. At the end of his life he copied the Eneados, a translation of Virgil's Aeneid by Gavin Douglas into a manuscript now kept at Lambeth Palace. He co-signed the manuscript, "Heir ends the buke of Virgill written by the hand of Johanne Mudy with Mr Thomas Bellenden of Auchinnoull Just. Clerke and endit the 2 Febrii Annorum xlv."Van Heijnsberg, Theo, in, The Renaissance in Scotland, Brill (1984), p. 195: James, M. R., ed., Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts, Lambeth Palace, (1932), p. 192
