David Blondel

David Blondel (1591 - April 6, 1655), French Protestant clergyman, was born at Chalons-sur-Marne.

In 1650 he succeeded GJ Vossius in the professorship of history at Amsterdam. His works were very numerous; in some of them he showed a remarkable critical faculty, as in his dissertation on Pope Joan (1647), in which he came to the conclusion, now universally accepted, that the whole story is a mere myth. Considerable Protestant indignation was excited against him on account of this book.

Reference

• This entry incorporates public domain text originally from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica.