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The Scope of Consent
The Scope of Consent

TOM DOUGHERTY

1
 3
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 Acknowledgements

When writing this book, I have been fortunate to benefit from many people.
I am particularly grateful to Johann Frick, Hugh Lazenby, Hallie Liberto,
and Victor Tadros, from whom I have learned an enormous amount about
the issues covered by this book. Some of my intellectual debts are so
important that I would like to highlight them at the outset. Johann has
made me appreciate how much philosophical mileage can be got from the
idea of interpersonal justification. Hugh has helped me realize the import-
ance of a consent-receiver’s epistemic access to the scope of consent. Hallie
has persuaded me that consent can be given by directives like requests, and
I have been significantly influenced by Victor’s challenges to the view that
uptake is not necessary for consent. In addition, Hallie and Victor came up
with cases that steered me towards the conclusion that someone can consent
to an action without intending to permit this action. These are only some of
the ways that they have shaped my views, and I am also grateful to each of
them for their support and friendship over the years.
I have also benefited a great deal from conversations with many other
philosophers and from their feedback on my work. The research for this
book has taken many years, and I have not done a great job of keeping
records of all of the people who have helped me along the way. Here is a no
doubt incomplete list of the people whom I would like to thank for conver-
sations and comments: Larry Alexander, Scott Anderson, David Archard,
Ralf Bader, Elizabeth Barnes, Christian Barry, Renée Jorgensen Bolinger,
David Boonin, Angela Breitenbach, Danielle Bromwich, Eamonn Callan,
Karam Chadha, Clare Chambers, Steve Clarke, Garrett Cullity, Robin
Dembroff, Luara Ferracioli, Kim Ferzan, John Filling, Helen Frowe,
Eduardo García-Ramirez, Eleanor Gordon-Smith, Dan Greco, Alex
Grzankowski, Simone Gubler, Dan Halliday, Sally Haslanger, Richard
Healey, Sam Hesni, Richard Holton, Joe Horton, Adam Hosein, Zöe
Johnson King, Karen Jones, Shelly Kagan, Rachel Keith, John Kleinig,
Quill Kukla, Rae Langton, Seth Lazar, Jed Lewinsohn, Christian List, Neil
Manson, Jeff McMahan, Kris McDaniel, Tristram McPherson, Colin
Marshall, Joseph Millum, Andreas Muller, Véronique Munoz-Dardé,
Mark Murphy, Serena Olsaretti, Mike Otsuka, David Owens, Tom Parr,
viii 

Hanna Pickard, Alejandro Perez-Carballo, Ketan Ramakrishnan, Anni Räty,

Massimo Renzo, Stella Rhode, Ian Rumfitt, Luke Russell, Bernhard Salow,
Paolo Santorio, Debra Satz, Peter Schaber, Laura Schroeter, Adam Slavny,
Paulina Sliwa, Lucy Smith, Michael Smith, Nic Southwood, Gopal
Sreenivasan, Aaron Thieme, Judy Thomson, Suzanne Uniacke, Beth
Valentine, Laura Valentini, Mark Van Roojen, Daniel Viehoff, Uri
Viehoff, Kenny Walden, Tom Walker, Alan Wertheimer, Caroline West,
Peter Westen, and Quinn White. Among the people who will not get the
public recognition that they deserve for helping me are anonymous
reviewers for journals and for Oxford University Press. Additional thanks
to Aaron Thieme for superlative proofreading on a tight schedule and for
apparently infinite patience when correcting comma abuse.
I have also benefited from feedback from audiences at the University of
Sydney, the Australian National University, the University of Melbourne,
University of Adelaide, the University of Western Australia, Victoria
University of Wellington, Charles Sturt University at Canberra, the
University of Canterbury, the University of Otago, the Australasian
Association of Philosophy Conference, the University of Cambridge, the
University of Oxford, the PPE Seminar of the Royal Institute of Philosophy,
Birkbeck University, University College London, the University of Stirling,
the University of Warwick, Queen’s University Belfast, the London School
of Economics, the Society for Applied Philosophy Conference, the
University of Glasgow, the University of York, the Joint Session of the
Mind Association and the Aristotelian Society, the University of
Birmingham, the University of Leeds, University of Münster, University of
Zurich, American Philosophical Association–Pacific Division Conference,
the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society Meeting, Yale University,
Georgetown University, the University of Colorado at Boulder, the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Connecticut at
Storrs, the University of Michigan, and the University of California at
Berkeley.
When writing this book, I have been supported by an Early Career
Leadership Fellows Award from the Arts and Humanities Research
Council (Council Reference: AH/N009533/1), by a Faculty Fellowship at
the Murphy Center at the University of Tulane, and by the institutions that
have employed me: Stanford University, the University of Sydney, the
University of Cambridge, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill.
Thanks to Alice Stevenson for the cover artwork.
  ix

I am also very grateful to Peter Momtchiloff for his advice and support in
his capacity as Senior Commissioning Editor for Philosophy at Oxford
University Press.
Most of all, I am indebted to the support of my friends and family.
 Introduction

0.1 The Scope of Consent

Like many philosophers, I have a talent for abstraction. That might sound
like boasting, but really ‘abstraction’ is just a polite word for not paying
attention to what is going on around you. Because this comes easily to me,
life is often full of surprises, like finding out after a medical procedure what it
involved. Apparently, a biopsy involves cutting out bits of one’s body. I had
thought that a tube was being put down my throat to take photos. It was a
good hospital, so the medical staff had asked whether I knew what a biopsy
was. Because I mistakenly half-thought that I did, I signed the consent form
without realizing what I was getting myself into. When I later found out
what had happened, I began to wonder: had I really consented to a biopsy?
By signing the form, I had certainly consented to something. But was the
actual medical procedure something that I had authorized? Or, as I like to
put that question, did the biopsy fall within the scope of my consent?
My answer is that because I signed a consent form for a biopsy, the biopsy
did fall within the scope of my consent. I secretly hope that this might strike
you as a piece of common sense, because this will make my view an easier
sell. But if it is common sense, then it is common sense that is denied by a
common view of consent. According to this view, consent is a normative
power in the following sense: by giving consent, we grant someone a
permission to perform an action at least in part by intending to permit
them to perform this action.¹ Some say that we give people these permis-
sions simply by willing that they have these permissions. Others say that we
also need to communicate that we are giving them these permissions. But
either way, the thought is that we consent to someone performing an action
partly by intending to permit them to perform that very action. While this

¹ Here and throughout this book, whenever gender is irrelevant, I use ‘they’ as a singular
gender-neutral pronoun both for characters in hypothetical examples and for scholars. I do so
largely for the reasons given in Dembroff & Wodak (2018), and also to avoid making assump-
tions about scholars’ genders.

The Scope of Consent. Tom Dougherty, Oxford University Press (2021). © Tom Dougherty.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894793.003.0001
2 

normative power view is attractive, there has not been sufficient appreci-
ation of one of its central problems, which is that it has implausible
implications for the scope of someone’s consent. If consenting to an action
requires intending to permit someone to perform that action, then one
cannot consent to a biopsy while failing to form an intention to permit a
biopsy. Since I achieved that feat when I bumbled through the hospital, the
normative power view is false.
In its place, I will propose an alternative view, which is centred around the
following three key ideas. First, consent involves deliberately engaging in
behaviour that expresses one’s will. Second, the scope of the consent partly
depends on the right way to interpret this expressive behaviour in light of
the available evidence. Third, the scope also depends on how this behaviour
should be interpreted in light of any extra evidence that the consent-receiver
has a duty to acquire. Let me briefly sketch each idea before showing how
these ideas apply to the case of the biopsy.
First idea: consent is an expression of the will. The first idea is a view of
what consent is. To give consent, it is not enough for us to have certain
thoughts. In addition, we need to engage in outward behaviour. Specifically,
we need to deliberately act in ways that express our wills concerning how
another person acts. There are two ways to do this. First, we can grant them
permission. Second, we can direct how they act. An example of a direction
would be a request for another person to perform an action.
Second idea: the scope of consent depends on the consent-receiver’s
evidence. Although consent requires that we deliberately engage in a type of
behaviour that expresses our wills, our intentions do not determine which
token actions are authorized by our consent. Instead, the range of authorized
actions is fixed by the correct way for our consent-giving behaviour to be
interpreted. Partly, this interpretation depends on the available evidence
concerning what we intended to permit when we engage in this behaviour.
But not any evidence will do. This evidence must meet two conditions. First,
we must reasonably accept that this evidence bears on how we should be
interpreted. Second, recipients of our consent must reasonably accept that
this evidence bears on how we should be interpreted. As a term of art, I call
evidence that meets both conditions, ‘reliable evidence’. The scope of our
consent is fixed in part by the reliable evidence that is actually available.
Third idea: the scope also depends on any evidence that the consent-
receiver has a duty to acquire. Sometimes, others have duties to acquire
additional reliable evidence about which actions we mean to cover. Let us
say that the ‘enhanced reliable evidence’ is the sum of this extra evidence
         3

and the available reliable evidence. The scope of our consent is also fixed in
part by the enhanced reliable evidence about what we intend to cover with
our consent.
Together, these ideas imply that I did consent to the biopsy. By signing a
consent form, I was deliberately engaging in permission-giving behaviour.
Indeed, I was also deliberately directing the medical staff ’s behaviour with a
request. Therefore, twice over I was deliberately expressing my will in a way
that constituted giving consent. To interpret this expression of my will, the
medical staff had the following evidence: I had signed a form that clearly
stated that the procedure was a biopsy, and I had indicated that I knew what
a biopsy was. I had to reasonably accept that my consent should be inter-
preted in light of this evidence. Admittedly, that evidence was misleading,
given that I did not know what a biopsy was and hence did not intend to
authorize a biopsy. But all the same, I had given the medical staff compelling
evidence that I intended to authorize a biopsy when I signed the consent
form. Moreover, the medical staff had no duty to acquire additional evi-
dence concerning what I intended to authorize. By getting my response that
I knew what a biopsy was, the staff had done all that was required of them.
Therefore, the available reliable evidence was the same as the enhanced
reliable evidence. Since this evidence sufficiently supported the interpret-
ation that I intended to authorize a biopsy by signing the consent form, the
biopsy fell within the scope of my consent.

0.2 Sexual Deception and the Story behind This Book

I arrived at that view as the result of a project that began with an interest in
lying to get laid. Let me illustrate this with a true story.
Even though April Fool’s Day is an inauspicious day for a wedding, you
still would not expect the marriage to end with the bride suing the Cuban
government for sexual misconduct.² Yet that was the conclusion of Ana
Margarita Martinez’s marriage to Juan Pablo Roque, after Roque disap-
peared from their Florida residence (Bragg 1999). The mystery of Roque’s
absence was resolved a few days later when Roque appeared on television
broadcast from Havana and unveiled themselves as an undercover spy sent
to infiltrate the dissident community in the United States. This was an

² With minor modification, this paragraph is quoted from Dougherty (2018a).

4 

unwelcome surprise for Martinez, who had thought that Roque was a fellow
dissident. Outraged, Martinez filed a lawsuit about the deception against
Roque’s employer—the Republic of Cuba. Since Cuba was not in the habit of
defending itself in the Florida legal system, Cuba did not contest the suit,
and the court awarded Martinez millions of dollars in damages. Part of
Martinez’s case was based on the claim that Roque’s fraud meant that
Martinez did not consent to sex with Roque.
There is a promising way to make Martinez’s case and an unpromising
way. The unpromising way was chosen by Martinez’s lawyer, who said
that Martinez ‘would not have given [their] consent, had [they] known’.
This puts the case in terms of counterfactuals: the lawyer appeals to what
Martinez would not have consented to. The problem with this approach is
that counterfactuals can hold for all sorts of weird reasons. Suppose that
Roque had instead concealed that they were a world champion at massage.
And suppose that if Martinez had known that Roque was a world champion
at massage, then Martinez would have refused to have sex on one of their
early dates and instead insisted on a massage. Even if counterfactually
Martinez ‘would not have given their consent, had they known’ how good
Roque was at massage, this counterfactual holds for a weird reason that does
not bear on whether Martinez consents in the actual world. Because coun-
terfactuals can hold for weird reasons, counterfactuals do not determine
whether someone gives valid consent to another person.
The promising way to make Martinez’s claim is to say that sex with Roque
did not fall within the scope of Martinez’s consent.³ By ‘the scope of Martinez’s
consent’, I mean the set of sexual encounters that Martinez made permissible
by giving consent. Consider the principle that this scope was determined by the
content of Martinez’s intentions. On the assumption that Martinez did not
intend to permit sex with a spy, this principle implies that sex with a spy did not
fall within the scope of Martinez’s consent. Given that Roque was a spy, it
would then follow that sex with Roque fell outside the scope of Martinez’s
consent. That is to say that Martinez did not consent to sex with Roque.
I had in mind this type of scope-based argument, rather than a
counterfactual-based argument, when I wrote the article that began my
interest in the topic of this book.⁴ In ‘Sex, Lies, and Consent’, I defended

³ A different way to make the claim is to invoke the idea that Martinez was insufficiently
informed to give valid consent. For discussion of how sexual deception can invalidate consent,
see Lazenby & Gabriel (2018).
⁴ The argument does not focus on what someone would agree to in a counterfactual scenario
but instead focuses on the actual scope of their consent. The argument relies on the premise that
         5

the principle that our intentions determine the scope of our consent. As
I put the idea, ‘the rights that we waive are the rights that we intend to waive’
(Dougherty 2013: 734). That principle prompts us to think about the
features of a sexual encounter to which the consent-giver’s will is opposed
in the following sense: the consent-giver intends not to permit an encounter
with any of these features. I called such a feature a ‘deal-breaker’.⁵ It follows
from this principle and definition that if a deceiver hides from their victim
the fact that a sexual encounter has a feature that is a deal-breaker for the
victim, then the victim does not consent to this encounter. Since this principle
places no restrictions on what counts as a deal-breaker, it is not just someone
like Roque who is in trouble. The principle implies that a sexual encounter
could fall outside the scope of someone’s consent in virtue of deception about
any feature whatsoever. For example, this could potentially be deception
about someone’s natural hair colour or the university that they attended. If
either of these features is a deal-breaker for the consent-giver, then this
deception would lead to a non-consensual encounter.
What I came to see as the central mistake of that article was my
assumption that consent is a mental phenomenon.⁶ This assumption led
me to think that our intentions determine the scope of our consent.
However, I now think that this assumption is wrong. Our mental states
are private, and yet consent publicly transforms our moral relationships

the scope of their consent is grounded in the actual intentions that they have in the actual
scenario in which they give consent. For criticism of the article based on interpreting it as
making the counterfactual argument, see Tadros (2016); Manson (2017); Jubb (2017);
Bromwich & Millum (2018). Jonathan Herring (2005) makes a counterfactual-based argument
in defence of a similar conclusion to my conclusion about sexual deception. For an extension of
the argument beyond deal-breakers, see Matey (2019).
⁵ A possible defect of this term is that it may suggest that we should consider the deals that
someone would or would not counterfactually make. However, my definition concerns only the
actual contents of the consent-giver’s actual attitudes.
⁶ Another important mistake concerned my argument about the gravity of certain forms of
sexual misconduct. The article attracted criticism that persuaded me that I had offered a weak
argument for my claim that it is seriously wrong to have sex with someone without their consent
(Manson 2017; Brown 2020; Boonin n.d.). One of the main reasons that I offered for this claim
was that the claim provides the best explanation of why it is wrong to have sex with a comatose
person. However, I failed to consider key alternative hypotheses. Consider, for example, the
alternative hypothesis that it is seriously wrong to have sex with someone without their consent
when they strongly desire that this sexual encounter not take place. This hypothesis also
explains why it is seriously wrong to have sex with a comatose person. But the hypothesis
avoids implying that it is seriously wrong for a Yale graduate to have sex with a victim who does
not intend to have sex with a Yale graduate, yet does not strongly desire to avoid sex with a Yale
graduate. In so far as that implication strikes people as counterintuitive, the rival hypothesis
provides an explanation that is more attractive than mine of why it is wrong to have sex with a
comatose person. Given the availability of competing hypotheses like this, my argument to the
best explanation was weak.
6 

with each other. Since consent is a public phenomenon, we must engage in

outward behaviour to give consent. Once we take on board that point, we
lose the motivation to hold that our intentions all by themselves fix the
scope of our consent.
So what does fix the scope of consent? For a while, my hypothesis was that
the scope is determined by the permissions that the consent-giver success-
fully communicates to the consent-receiver. That hypothesis implies that
consent involves a meeting of minds between the consent-giver and the
consent-receiver. Through this meeting of minds, the consent-giver can
control the consent-receiver’s behaviour. Since there was no meeting of
the minds between Martinez and Roque that Martinez was permitting
sex with an undercover spy, that hypothesis bodes ill for Roque. The
hypothesis implies that if Martinez did not communicate that Martinez
was permitting sex with a spy, then sex with a spy lay outside the scope of
Martinez’s consent.
However, I ended up thinking that this hypothesis faces two decisive
objections. The first objection is that consent can be given by someone who
publicly declares that they are giving someone a permission, even though
this declaration has not yet come to the attention of the consent-receiver.
For example, a homeowner can consent to a neighbour walking on their
lawn by putting up a sign that indicates that the neighbour is permitted to
walk on the lawn. Even if the neighbour has not yet read the sign, the sign
would still create a permission for the neighbour to walk on the lawn. The
second objection is that someone can consent to a particular action, even
though they do not intend to permit this action. This scenario is exemplified
by our introductory case of the biopsy. The scenario is also exemplified by a
case in which a sober customer falsely believes that they are intoxicated, and
so does not believe that they can validly consent to a tattoo. We can suppose
that the customer thinks that it is common knowledge with the tattoo artist
that the customer is too drunk to permit the tattoo, and consequently the
customer does not attempt to communicate that they are giving the tattoo
artist a new permission. Yet by requesting the tattoo, the customer would
give consent to the tattoo.
Because of cases like the tattoo case, I settled on the view that consent is
given not only by behaviour that expresses permission, but also by directions
like requests. While that view answers the question of what consent is, the
view does not yet answer the question of what fixes the scope of consent.
While I was puzzled about this question, I was also writing about how
coercion invalidates consent and about what is required for informed
         7

consent.⁷ For those topics, I increasingly found it helpful to place consent

within Thomas Scanlon’s (1986, 1998) view of the moral significance of
choice. What I found so useful about Scanlon’s view was the theoretical role
that the view gives to interpersonal justification. On Scanlon’s view, the
permissibility of an agent’s action depends on whether the agent can justify
the action to each individual who is affected by the action. While I did not
agree with Scanlon’s claim that all of interpersonal morality can be explained
in terms of interpersonal justification, I was persuaded that interpersonal
justification structures an important part of interpersonal morality, includ-
ing the part that concerns consent.⁸ On these grounds, I came to think of
consent as a consideration that a consent-receiver can invoke in order to
justify their behaviour to the consent-giver.
If we think of consent in terms of interpersonal justification, then we can
make progress on the scope of consent by asking the following question:
how can a consent-receiver justify an action by appealing to the consent? My
answer to this question has two parts. First, a consent-receiver can justify
their behaviour by appealing to how the consent-giver has expressed their
will for how the consent-receiver behaves. Second, this justification is
evidentially constrained. On the one hand, it is constrained by the available
evidence concerning how the consent should be interpreted. On the other
hand, it is also constrained by any evidence that the consent-receiver has a
duty to acquire. In both respects, this justification is constrained by the
evidence that the consent-giver and the consent-receiver must reasonably
accept as bearing on how the consent should be interpreted. When the
relevant evidence sufficiently supports the interpretation that the consent-
giver engaged in their consent-giving behaviour with a certain action in
mind, the consent-receiver can appeal to the consent in order to justify
performing the action.
What does this principle for the scope of consent imply for sexual
deception? We will return to this question at the end of the book, but let
me flag up front two key implications. First, this principle allows for leniency
towards an agent when there is no available evidence that a sexual encounter

⁷ Some of this work has been published in Dougherty (2020, 2021, forthcoming). Other work
of mine on coerced consent is currently unpublished. Although I do not discuss at length in this
book the conditions for when consent is valid, an interpersonal justification approach to consent
gets further support from providing an attractive account of these validity conditions.
⁸ For work that also aims to circumscribe the role that interpersonal justification plays in
interpersonal morality, see Frick (2015: 219–223). For related criticism of non-circumscribed
contractualism, see Kamm (2007: 455–490).
8 

involves a deal-breaker for their partner and the agent has no duty to acquire
further evidence about this. Second, the principle still has severe implica-
tions for some deceivers. For example, if Roque’s evidence indicates that sex
with a spy is a deal-breaker for Martinez, then Martinez did not consent to
sex with Roque.

0.3 This Book’s Structure and a Road Map

The book’s structure follows the trajectory of my thinking about the scope of
consent. The book has three main parts, each of which discusses a separate
account. Each account is a package of a view of consent, a principle for
consent’s scope, and an argument that motivates this view and principle.
Part I of the book sets out the ‘Mental Account’. According to this account,
consent is a mental phenomenon, and the scope of consent is fixed by the
consent-giver’s intentions. Part II sets out the ‘Successful Communication
Account’. According to this account, consent involves communicative
behaviour, and the scope of consent is fixed by what the consent-giver
successfully communicates to the consent-receiver. Part III sets out the
‘Evidential Account’, which I endorse. According to this account, consent
involves deliberately expressing one’s will, and the scope of consent is fixed
by certain evidence concerning how the consent should be interpreted.
Here is how that structure breaks down, chapter by chapter. In Chapter 1,
I begin by clarifying the question of what fixes the scope of consent, and
I discuss the methods that I will use to answer the question.
In Part I of the book, I discuss the Mental Account. In Chapter 2, I discuss
the account’s principal motivation. This is the ‘Autonomy Argument’. The
rough idea is that since consent is an expression of our autonomy, and since
our intentions are always under our control, consent consists in our
intentions.
In Chapter 3, I argue that the Autonomy Argument also has implications
for the scope of consent. There is little value to the consent-giver controlling
whether they consent, unless they also control what they consent to. This
extension of the Autonomy Argument motivates the ‘Permissive Intention
Principle’ for the scope of consent. This principle grounds the scope of
consent in the mental content of the consent-giver’s intentions concerning
which actions to permit.
In Part II of the book, I set out the case for and against the Successful
Communication Account. This account endorses the Behavioural View of
  ’      9

consent, according to which consent requires external behaviour. In

Chapter 4, I argue that we should reject the Mental View in favour of the
Behavioural View on the grounds that consent is a public phenomenon.
In Chapter 5, I turn to a specific version of the Behavioural View. This is
the Successful Communication View. This view can be motivated by the idea
that an agent wrongs a victim by acting in the victim’s personal domain in a
way that the victim does not control. This idea lies at the heart of the ‘Control
Argument’. The argument also supports the ‘Successful Communication
Principle’ for the scope of consent. According to this principle, an action
falls within the scope of someone’s consent when the consent-giver success-
fully communicates an intention to permit this action.
In Chapter 6, I offer the first part of my argument for why we should reject
the Successful Communication Principle. The principle implies that consent
is given only when a consent-receiver recognizes that the consent was given.
However, this implication is false. A counterexample is the aforementioned
case in which a homeowner puts up a sign that states that a neighbour can
walk on the homeowner’s lawn. By putting up the sign, the homeowner
consents to the neighbour walking on the lawn even if the neighbour remains
unaware of the sign. We can see this by considering the possibility that a third
party reads the sign. Since the third party would know that the homeowner
has given consent, it follows that the homeowner has given consent.
In Chapter 7, I offer the second part of my argument for rejecting the
Successful Communication Principle. Like the Permissive Intention
Principle, the Successful Communication Principle implies that an action
falls within the scope of someone’s consent only when they intend to permit
this action. That implication is also false. There are various cases in which
the appropriate interpretation of a consent-giver’s public behaviour diverges
from their private intentions. Examples include the aforementioned biopsy
case and the aforementioned tattoo case. When the consent-giver’s behav-
iour diverges from their intentions, the scope of their consent is fixed by the
appropriate interpretation of their behaviour.
In Part III, I develop the account of consent that I endorse. This is the
Evidential Account. In Chapter 8, I start to develop the ‘Expression of Will
View’ of consent. I motivate this view with the ‘Interpersonal Justification
Argument’. This argument focuses on the idea that an agent can justify
treating an individual in a certain way by appealing to how the individual
has expressed their will.
In Chapter 9, I elaborate that the Expression of Will View is a disjunctive
view, in so far as it allows that consent can be given either by deliberate
10 

behaviour that expresses permission or by deliberate behaviour that directs

how another person acts.
In Chapter 10, I return to the question of which principle governs the
scope of consent. I argue that the scope is not fixed by conventions but
instead by certain evidence about what the consent-giver intends to cover
with their consent. To formulate a precise principle for the scope of consent,
I introduce the notion of ‘reliable evidence’. This is the evidence such that
both the consent-giver and the consent-receiver must reasonably accept that
this evidence bears on the appropriate interpretation of the consent. Using
this notion, I formulate the ‘Available Reliable Evidence Principle’ for the
scope of consent. According to this principle, an action falls within the scope
of someone’s consent when the reliable evidence that is actually available
sufficiently supports interpreting the consent-giver as intending their con-
sent-giving behaviour to apply to this action. This principle is almost
correct, but requires an important modification.
That modification comes in Chapter 11, where I argue that the scope of
someone’s consent is also determined by any additional reliable evidence
that the consent-receiver has a duty to acquire. I define the ‘enhanced
reliable evidence’ as the union of the available reliable evidence and any
reliable evidence that the consent-receiver has a duty to acquire. I conclude
that we should accept the ‘Due Diligence Principle’ for the scope of consent.
According to this principle, an action falls within the scope of someone’s
consent when both the available reliable evidence and the enhanced reliable
evidence sufficiently support interpreting the consent-giver as intending
their consent-giving behaviour to apply to this action.
In the concluding Chapter 12, I summarize the Evidential Account and
survey the remaining doubts that we may have about this account. I end this
book by revisiting the topic of sexual deception.
 1
The Question of Consent’s Scope

Consent allows people to perform a range of actions, but this range has its
limits. Ashley says to their house guest, ‘Make yourself at home while I am at
work,’ and now Taylor can put their feet up and watch television. But
Ashley’s consent does not give Taylor permission to stick their finger in
Ashley’s peanut butter and suck it clean, even if Taylor likes doing that in
their own home. Among all of the permissions that Ashley can give Taylor,
some will be granted by Ashley’s consent, while others will not. I call this
range of permissions the ‘scope’ of Ashley’s consent.¹
This book’s central question is which principle governs the scope of
someone’s consent. The correct principle will specify the considerations
that determine what this scope is. There are various hypotheses for what
these considerations might be. Is Taylor prohibited a peanut-buttery digit
because of Ashley’s intentions when giving consent? Is Taylor prohibited
this because of the meaning of what Ashley says? Because of how Taylor
interprets Ashley? Because of background conventions concerning what
house guests are allowed to do in people’s homes?
To set up our investigation into which principle is correct, a few prelim-
inaries will help. In Section 1.1, we will pin down the question of what
determines the scope of consent. In Section 1.2, we will look at the methods
that we will use to answer this question.

1.1 Framing Assumptions

The English word ‘consent’ is used broadly to refer to different moral

phenomena. Only one of these is this book’s topic. This is the consent that
releases other people from duties. It is sometimes called ‘permissive consent’

¹ For work that uses this definition of the ‘scope’ of consent, see Archard (1998: 6–7);
Manson (2018). This differs from what Neil Manson and Onora O’Neill (2007: 77–84) have
in mind when they talk of the ‘scope of informed consent requirements’. By this, they mean the
biomedical interactions for which people must seek the informed consent of patients or research
participants.

The Scope of Consent. Tom Dougherty, Oxford University Press (2021). © Tom Dougherty.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894793.003.0002
12     ’  

(Manson 2016). Permissive consent contrasts with other agreements, like

promises or transfers of property. These agreements can create duties and
bring about other changes in our moral relationships with each other. Since
this book’s topic is permissive consent, I will have this in mind whenever
I use the term ‘consent’ from now on.
Since consent can make actions permissible, it is theoretically important
for normative ethicists who are after a theory of right and wrong action. In
addition, consent is practically important for many of our interactions. In
particular, consent is necessary for making permissible certain medical
interactions and sexual interactions.² In turn, our theory of consent
should inform how we design the institutional and legal rules that govern
these interactions.
While institutional and legal issues will sometimes feature in our discus-
sion, our principal concern is with the morality of consent. When consent is
morally efficacious, I call it ‘valid consent’.³ When it is morally inefficacious,
I call it ‘invalid consent’. While the valid/invalid consent terminology is
widely used in moral philosophy and bioethics, it is less common in the
philosophy of the criminal law.⁴ This is because the criminal law itself often
uses the word ‘consent’ as a success term, so that the term only applies to
something that is legally efficacious.⁵ On the success term usage, one would
not describe someone as ‘consenting’ when they agree to sex at knifepoint.
In turn, some philosophers of the criminal law also use ‘consent’ as a success
term when they are talking about both legal consent and moral consent.
These philosophers would use different terms to describe what I call ‘invalid
consent’. For example, if someone agrees to sex at knifepoint, then Heidi
Hurd (1996) would describe this as merely ‘prima facie consent’, while
Kimberly Ferzan and Peter Westen (2017) would describe this as ‘assent’.

² Other key applications include consent to the use of property, consent to data-sharing, and
consent to the use of computers. However, I lack the expertise to address the complexity of these
issues. For a helpful essay on the legal aspects of consent to the use of computers, which brings
out the importance of the issue of consent’s scope, see Grimmelmann (2016).
³ The orthodoxy is that there are three necessary conditions for valid consent. First, valid
consent must be given by a suitably competent agent. For example, if someone is highly
intoxicated or a small child, then it is likely that their consent is morally inefficacious.
Second, valid consent must be given by someone who is suitably free. For example, consent
given under a death threat is also morally inefficacious. Third, valid consent must be given by
someone who is suitably informed. For example, medical consent is often not valid when given
by a patient who is unaware of alternative treatments.
⁴ For similar definitions of ‘valid consent’, see Wertheimer (2003: 121); Pallikkathayil (2011):
7; Tadros (2016: 204); Bolinger (2019: 80).
⁵ For consent in the law, see Westen (2004) and Beyleveld & Brownsword (2007). For
discussion of consent and sexual misconduct in the law, see Schulhofer (1998).
   13

Whether we use ‘consent’ as a success term is a merely terminological issue

on which nothing substantive hangs. This terminological issue will not affect
our discussion, as I will be setting to one side invalid consent.⁶ It is only
when consent is valid that the question arises: which actions are morally
affected by the consent?
To pin down that question, it will help to specify the way that valid
consent changes our moral relationships with each other. These relation-
ships have a dyadic structure in the respect that we have ‘directed duties’ that
we owe to each other. For example, you owe me a duty not to step on my
toes. This is equivalent to my having a claim-right against you that you not
step on my toes. By stating that your duty is equivalent to my right, I mean
that there is a single normative relationship that we can describe either as
you owing me that duty or as me having that right against you. With respect
to duties to omit actions, we can state the general equivalence between
directed duties and claim-rights as follows:⁷

X owes Y a duty not to perform A if and only if Y has a claim-right against

X not to perform A.

For brevity, I will simply call these ‘duties’ and ‘rights’ from now on. These
are the aspects of our moral relationships that are affected by consent. If
Y gives consent to X performing action A, then Y can release X from a duty
not to perform A and waive a right against X performing A. In that respect,
consent is a three-place relation between the individual giving consent, the
individual receiving consent, and an action (or set of actions). It will help to
have terms to refer to the individual who gives consent and the individual to
whom consent is given. Respectively, I call these individuals the ‘consent-
giver’ and the ‘consent-receiver’. I do not mean for this terminology to imply
that a consent-receiver must be aware of the consent. Indeed, in due course,
I will argue that someone can be unaware that they have received consent.
Instead, all that I mean by calling someone a ‘consent-receiver’ is that they
are the target of the consent.

⁶ Consequently, I will not discuss an interesting possibility that Serena Olsaretti suggested to
me. Could an instance of low-level coercion undermine consent to one action while not invali-
dating consent to a different action? If this is possible, then coercion can have the effect of putting
some, but not all actions outside the scope of someone’s consent.
⁷ For discussion of how claim-rights and duties correlate, see Thomson (1990). Some
scholars refer to directed duties as ‘bipolar obligations’. For discussion of directed duties and
bipolar obligations, see Sidgwick (1874); Sreenivasan (2010); Thompson (2004); Darwall (2006);
Cruft (2019); Wallace (2019).
14     ’  

The moral default is that we owe each other duties not to interact with
each other’s personal domains. For example, we have duties not to lay
hands on each other’s bodies or property. These duties form protective
perimeters that demarcate each individual’s personal domain. Consider
what happens if someone breaches one of these duties. Suppose that you
drop your antique crystal vase on my foot and the vase shatters. I can
complain that your action was wrong because it destroyed a valuable
crystal vase for no good reason. This complaint would not be grounded
in my right to determine how you act in my personal domain. By contrast,
if I complain that you are violating my right that you not harm my foot,
then I am voicing a domain-based complaint against your action. I have
this complaint because you have wronged me by breaching a duty that you
owed to me. This breach would typically leave a ‘moral residue’ in the sense
that you must apologize and compensate me for the harm that I suffered
(Thomson 1990: 82–98).
Valid consent has the normative effect of releasing people from these
domain-based duties. Consequently, an individual’s consent can make it the
case that the individual is not wronged by how an agent acts in the
individual’s personal domain. But while consent can eliminate this type of
wronging, it may be that the consent does not prevent the consent-receiver
from wronging the consent-giver in a different way. Suppose that Ashley
consents to Taylor hanging out in their home while Ashley is at work.
In addition, Ashley makes Taylor promise to go out and buy milk at some
point during the day. Taylor does not buy milk and instead stays inside all
day. By staying inside all day, Taylor does not wrong Ashley in virtue of
trespassing in Ashley’s personal domain. That wronging is precluded by
Ashley’s consent. However, Taylor does wrong Ashley in virtue of breaking
their promise to Ashley. Ashley’s consent does not eliminate this wronging.
This illustrates the general phenomenon that even if an individual consents
to an agent’s action, it may still be that the agent wrongs the individual with
this action, and it may still be that the action is impermissible. This point is
particularly important for sexual ethics. While an agent needs their partner’s
sexual consent to avoid wronging them, consent is not a moral panacea.
A sexual encounter can be consensual and yet be morally problematic on
other grounds.
Since consent releases people from duties and waives rights, the norma-
tive effects of consent are constrained by facts about which duties and rights
we have simply as moral persons. These are our ‘natural’ rights and duties,
which contrast with the rights and duties that we ‘acquire’ as a result of our
   15

interactions and relationships with other individuals.⁸ Within theories of

rights, it is uncontroversial that we have natural rights that others do not
interfere with our personal domains. These rights correlate with duties to
omit certain actions. It is more controversial whether we have any natural
rights that correlate with duties that others have to perform actions. To avoid
unnecessary controversy, I will remain neutral on whether we have natural
rights that correlate with duties to perform actions. Instead, I will focus on
natural rights that correlate with duties to omit actions. These duties of
omission are the locus of most, if not all, of the practical interest in consent.
For example, medical consent releases people from duties to refrain from
medical procedures, while sexual consent releases people from duties to
refrain from sexual activity.
Some people object to thinking of sexual ethics in this way. They worry
that this portrays sexual activity as asymmetric, with one party doing
something to another. Moreover, some people worry that this problem is
aggravated by the gendered assumption that men play the role of initiators
and women, the passive consenters.⁹ I am sympathetic to the concern that
consent is often talked about in this way, but I do not see this as a problem
that is inherent in the concept of consent itself. We can employ the concept
in egalitarian discourse that recognizes everyone’s sexual agency. For
example, it is conceptually coherent to say that two people need each other’s
consent to an encounter in which they are equally sexual agents.¹⁰ Similarly,
it is coherent to say that the moral default is that two people symmetrically
have duties not to engage in sexual activity with each other, and they each
need to release the other from these duties.
Another constraint on the normative effects of our consent comes from
the grain of the rights that we possess. Some people take the view that we
have coarse-grained rights that others do not have sex with us, but we lack
fine-grained rights against specific types of sexual interaction. To illustrate
this type of view, consider the following case of Hallie Liberto’s (2017: S134):

⁸ There is a terminological issue as to when, if ever, we should use the term ‘consent’ to refer
to releasing people from acquired duties and waiving acquired rights. I will remain neutral on
this terminological issue because nothing substantive hangs on it and because acquired rights
and duties will not be the primary focus of our discussion.
⁹ In particular, see MacKinnon (2016: 440) and also Palmer(2017: 476); Kukla (2018:
75–76); Gardner (2018: 60).
¹⁰ As Karamvir Chadha (2020) points out, joint sexual activity is composed of particular
sexual acts performed by individuals, and these individuals need each other’s consent for
performing these acts.
16     ’  

Paternalistic Deal-Breaker. Jo and Casey are having sex. Jo catches a

slightly pained expression on Casey’s face and asks Casey if the intercourse
is hurting Casey. Casey knows that if Jo learns that the intercourse is
hurting Casey, that Jo will want to stop having sex with Casey immediately,
for Casey’s sake. Casey is in some pain but wants Jo to have a sexually
satisfying experience. Casey says, ‘No, honey.’

To analyse this case, Liberto (2017: S137) makes the following two claims.
First, Jo has a coarse-grained right that Casey not have sex with Jo. Second,
Jo does not have a fine-grained right that Casey not have sex with Jo when
Casey is in pain. Since consent can only make a difference to rights and
duties that actually exist, the scope of Jo’s consent could not be affected by a
non-existent fine-grained right. Therefore, on Liberto’s view, it is impossible
for Jo to restrict the scope of their consent to sexual encounters in which
Casey is not in pain.¹¹
The normative effects of consent are also constrained by facts about
which rights and duties the consent-giver has the authority to change. For
example, when Ashley tells Taylor to make themselves at home, Taylor’s
range of new permissions is partly determined by the permissions that
Ashley can grant. Ashley cannot let Taylor clamber through their neigh-
bour’s window to make toast, since it is not up to Ashley who gets to do that.
Since Taylor owes that duty to the neighbour, Ashley cannot release Taylor
from the duty. Likewise, the normative effects of our consent would also be
constrained if we cannot waive some of our own rights (Tadros 2011, 2016).
Suppose that someone explicitly says to another person, ‘You may kill and
then eat me.’ The consent-giver clearly means to permit being cannibalized.
But consider the hypothesis that the consent-giver cannot waive their right
against being cannibalized. If this hypothesis is correct, then the consent
would not create a permission for the consent-receiver to cannibalize the
consent-giver. Similarly, if the consent-giver cannot waive their right against
being cannibalized, then this would restrict the normative effects brought
about by the consent-giver saying, ‘You can do whatever you want to me.’
Because of these points, our background theory of rights and duties
constrains our account of how consent changes our moral relationships

¹¹ There is a separate issue of whether someone can place conditions on when their consent
has moral force. For example, Jo could say, ‘On condition that you do not have a headache,
I hereby waive my right against sex with you.’ For discussion of conditional consent, see Chadha
(forthcoming).
  17

with each other. In this book, I will be setting to one side the question of
which background rights and duties we have. Downstream from accepting a
theory of these background rights and duties, we need a principle that tells
us which of these are altered by someone’s consent. That principle is the
focus of this book. Accordingly, the foregoing points are framing assump-
tions for our discussion. These points circumscribe this book’s central
question of what determines the scope of someone’s consent. We can state
this question as follows: of the domain-based duties from which a consent-
giver can release a consent-receiver, what determines which duties are
eliminated by the consent-giver’s valid consent? Since rights are equivalent
to duties, that question could also be stated in terms of rights. To avoid
cluttering our discussion by repeating these framing assumptions, I will
leave these implicit from now on.

1.2 Methodology

What methods should we use to answer the question of what determines the
scope of consent? There are four methods that I will sketch upfront.
The comparative method. Often, it is a good idea to answer a philosoph-
ical question holistically, by fleshing out alternative answers and choosing
between these answers in light of all their respective advantages and disad-
vantages. As well as making it more likely that we arrive at the truth, this
method helps us understand why the question is philosophically interesting
and difficult. This is how I interpret the ‘comparative method’ of moral
philosophy.¹²
Here is how I will adopt the comparative method in our inquiry.
Ultimately, we are seeking the correct principle that specifies what deter-
mines the scope of someone’s consent. To choose between candidate prin-
ciples, we need to see how these principles can combine with views of what
constitutes consent, as well as arguments that motivate these views and
principles. I will use the term ‘accounts’ to refer to packages of arguments,
views of consent, and principles for consent’s scope. This book will compare
the pros and cons of three main accounts. These are the Mental Account, the
Successful Communication Account, and the Evidential Account. When we

¹² A paradigmatic use of this method is Henry Sidgwick’s (1874) investigation into the
‘Methods of Ethics’. I interpret John Rawls (1971) as using this method when arguing for
their principles of justice over utilitarianism.
18     ’  

investigate these accounts, it will turn out that there is a special reason to
adopt the comparative method for our inquiry: certain arguments for views
of consent also provide support for principles governing consent’s scope.
The method of cases. One way to make progress in moral philosophy is
to consider the implications that views and principles have for various cases.
This is the so-called method of cases. It has two parts. First, the method
involves taking an independent stance on which claims we should accept or
reject about certain cases. Sometimes, these claims can be accepted as
intrinsically plausible. Often, when philosophers wish to indicate that we
should accept a claim on its own terms, then they will describe this claim as
‘intuitively’ correct or say that the claim is supported by ‘intuition’.
As I understand talk of ‘intuition’ in this context, this does not presuppose
any particular moral epistemology and instead is simply a way of flagging
that a claim is being offered as an undefended premise in an argument. On
this way of thinking, if one philosopher presents a claim as ‘intuitive’, and
another philosopher does not find the claim plausible, then the latter
philosopher does not accept a premise in the former philosopher’s argu-
ment. At other times, it can be appropriate either to provide a sub-argument
that defends a claim about a case or a discussion of the claim that makes
clear why we should accept it. Second, the method uses these claims to
evaluate views and principles. On the one hand, if a view or principle entails
a claim that we independently have reason to reject, then we have reason to
reject the view or principle. On the other hand, if a view or principle entails a
claim that we ought to accept, then that counts in favour of the view or
principle. In this book, I will use this method extensively to decide which
views and principles to reject and which to accept.
There are at least three reasons why the method of cases can be helpful.
First, if we just discuss abstract ideas, then our discussion risks becoming
hard to follow and engage with. It is easier to see what it is at issue when we
look at concrete examples. In this respect, I think of using cases as imple-
menting the common advice that authors should use examples to make their
writing clear and easy to follow. Second, using cases can also make commu-
nication more efficient. Once a community of philosophers has the knack
for thinking about what principles imply about cases, these philosophers can
quickly communicate a lot with a little. Third, the method of cases pushes us
to dive deep into the details of our topic. It is easy to skate over distinctions
when doing philosophy at a high level of abstraction, and it is also easy to
miss implications of views or principles. A good way to probe these details is
to consider what these views and principles imply for cases. I do not mean to
imply that the method of cases is essential in this regard. Certainly, there are
  19

normative ethicists who build detailed theories without focusing on cases.

However, I think that it is fair to say that as a general trend the method of
cases tends to lead to more detailed theories of normative ethics. I take this
to reflect how helpful the method can be for uncovering detail.
Bigger-picture arguments. The method of cases has its limits. Let me
mention two in particular.
First, the method comes unstuck when people do not share intuitions
about cases. I see this as an instance of a more general problem. To avoid an
infinite regress, an argument must eventually rely on fundamental premises
that are not supported by other premises. If people do not agree about these
fundamental premises, then the argument will not help these people make
philosophical progress together. This general problem potentially affects any
argumentative method that we use in philosophy.
Second, the method of cases will not by itself help us see the wood for the
trees. Ideally, we do not want to see lots of isolated items of detail. We also
want to see how these details hang together in a bigger-picture view.
Consequently, we should supplement case-based arguments with bigger-
picture arguments. Towards that end, I will consider arguments that draw
on general moral considerations to answer questions like: what is the
relationship between consent and autonomy? Which values are promoted
when there is a meeting of minds between the consent-giver and the
consent-receiver? In what respect is it morally important that a consent-
giver controls the consent-receiver’s behaviour? What role does consent play
in interpersonal justification? By reflecting on these questions, we can build
arguments that help us choose between views and principles.
Using other parts of philosophy. Our inquiry will concern the moral
significance of our thoughts, communicative behaviour, and evidence. As a
result, our inquiry brings moral philosophy into dialogue with work in the
philosophy of mind, the philosophy of language, and epistemology. Drawing
on work in these fields can help us make progress in our inquiry into the
scope of consent. In particular, this work can help us be precise when talking
about thoughts, communication, and evidence.
However, work outside moral philosophy does not offer us easy answers
to moral questions, such as the question of what determines the scope of
consent. In general, we cannot move straight from premises about minds,
language, or evidence to conclusions about morality. Instead, moral prem-
ises are always required. For example, I will argue that the scope of consent is
determined by the appropriate interpretation of the consent-giver’s behav-
iour. This raises the question of which interpretation is ‘appropriate’. To
answer this question, we need to engage in moral philosophy. We cannot
20     ’  

answer this question just by considering which theory of interpretation is

endorsed by philosophers of language. If a theory of interpretation is
developed without constraints from moral philosophy, then there is no
guarantee that this theory will articulate a conception of interpretation
that is suitable for theoretical work in a moral theory. To determine whether
the conception is suitable, there is no substitute for substantive moral
theorizing.

1.3 Summary

The question of the scope of consent is a question about which moral

changes are brought about by consent (Section 1.1). When someone’s
consent is valid, it changes their relationship with the consent-receiver by
releasing the consent-receiver from a duty. This would be a duty that the
consent-receiver owes to the consent-giver with respect to how the consent-
receiver acts in the consent-giver’s personal domain. Since the consent-
receiver’s duty is equivalent to the consent-giver’s right, consent also has
the moral effect of waiving a right. In this book, we will set to one side the
questions of which rights and duties we have and which conditions must be
met for consent to be valid. Instead, we will ask a downstream question. In
terms of rights, this question is: what determines which of these waivable
rights are waived by someone’s valid consent? Or equivalently, this question
can be put in terms of duties: of all the duties from which the consent-giver
can release the consent-receiver, what determines the duties from which the
consent-receiver is released by the consent-giver’s valid consent? An impre-
cise, but much simpler way of putting the question is: what determines
which actions become permissible as the result of someone’s consent? That
simple way of stating the question is not exact, given that an encounter can
be consensual, yet impermissible, but it is a reasonable approximation to the
question of this book.
To answer that question, we will use four methods (see Section 1.2). First,
we will look at the pros and cons of three rival accounts. Each account is
made up of a view of consent, a principle for consent’s scope, and an
argument that supports this view and principle. Second, we will develop
and evaluate these accounts by considering their implications for various
cases. Third, we will look at bigger-picture arguments. Fourth, we will
inform our discussion by drawing on work in the philosophy of mind, the
philosophy of language, and epistemology.
 2
The Mental View

What is consent? This may sound like a purely metaphysical question, but
really it is a question about morality—about what changes our moral
relationships with each other (Wertheimer 2000).
That means that the question has implications both for our theory of
which actions are right and wrong and for our policies that deter and punish
wrongdoing. Nowadays, it is common for a jurisdiction’s criminal law to
define serious sexual offences partly in terms of the absence of valid con-
sent.¹ In turn, this requires defining consent. The standard legal definition is
in terms of someone’s will or choice. For example, the United Kingdom’s
2003 Sexual Offences Act states that ‘a person consents if he agrees by
choice, and has the freedom and capacity to make that choice’.² Similarly,
when revising the sexual offences section of the Model Penal Code, the
American Law Institute recently defined consent in terms of someone’s
willingness to engage in sexual activity (Moringo 2016). These legal defin-
itions resonate with the common idea that a sexual encounter is non-
consensual when it is against a victim’s will. With respect to morality, this
idea is captured by the following view of consent:

Mental View of Consent. X gives consent to Y if and only if X has a certain

mental attitude.

Here I am using the term ‘mental attitude’ loosely to cover both mental
events and mental states. To fill in the details of the Mental View, we need to
say more about which mental attitude constitutes consent. The Mental View
contrasts with the Behavioural View, according to which consent requires
certain behaviour. There are different versions of the Behavioural View,

¹ The criminal law often uses other terms to refer to valid consent. For example, sometimes
this is referred to simply as ‘consent’. In that terminology, invalid consent would be described as,
e.g., the ‘absence of consent’. In the United States, a small number of states’ rape laws include an
‘affirmative consent definition’ according to which consent must be expressed in behaviour
(Tuerkheimer 2016: 451).
² https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/contents, accessed 6 October 2018.

The Scope of Consent. Tom Dougherty, Oxford University Press (2021). © Tom Dougherty.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894793.003.0003
24   

which take different stances concerning what is sufficient for consent. But all
versions of the Behavioural View posit a necessary condition for consent: the
consent-giver must engage in certain behaviour. This necessary condition is
denied by the Mental View.
In this chapter, we will develop the Mental View of consent and consider
what motivates the view. In Section 2.1, we will lay out the central argument
in favour of the Mental View. This is the Autonomy Argument. In
Section 2.2, we will turn to the question of which position the Mental
View should take concerning the type of attitude that constitutes consent.
In Section 2.3, we will critically assess the Autonomy Argument by consid-
ering the extent to which the Behavioural View also connects consent with
autonomy.

2.1 The Autonomy Argument

One way to motivate the Mental View over the Behavioural View is to argue
that the Mental View has more attractive implications for particular cases.
Along these lines, Larry Alexander (2014: 105) discusses a case in which a
foreigner decides to let their partner fondle them. However, the foreigner
has a poor grasp of their partner’s language. The foreigner utters a phrase
that means ‘do it’ in their own language, but means ‘do not’ in their partner’s
language. Accordingly, their partner believes that the foreigner is unwilling
to be fondled, but their partner continues to fondle the foreigner nonethe-
less. Alexander (2014: 105) has the intuition that their partner ‘is doing
nothing that is without [the foreigner’s] consent and therefore wrong’.
Similarly, Heidi Hurd (1996: 137) considers a case in which someone who
cannot move, hear, or speak intends to have sex with another person, even
though the former person cannot communicate with the latter. Hurd’s
intuition is that the former person consents to the sex.
This strategy of appealing to cases has had mixed results. Many people
have the opposite intuitions about these cases. For example, Alan
Wertheimer (2000: 571) also considers a case in which an individual is
willing to have sex with their partner, even though the individual indicates
that they are unwilling to have sex.³ Since their partner believes that the
individual is unwilling to have sex, this case is structurally analogous to

³ This is a hypothetical variant on the infamous 1975 case in the United Kingdom’s House of
Lords, Director of Public Prosecutions v. Morgan, in which the victim was unwilling to engage in
    25

Alexander’s case. However, Wertheimer has the intuition that this individual
does not consent. In addition, Wertheimer (2003: 147) considers the very
same case as Hurd’s. However, Wertheimer has the intuition that consent is
absent in this case.
As will become clear in the course of this book, I like using hypothetical
cases as much as the next philosopher. Otherwise, philosophical arguments
risk becoming inaccessibly abstract, and it is hard to see the implications of
general principles. But the case-based methodology has its limits. It breaks
down when people disagree in their intuitions about the relevant cases. This
disagreement makes the method dialectically unhelpful. We cannot change
someone’s mind by appealing to intuitions that they do not share. So, when
the method of cases leads to an impasse, we need to look for other argu-
ments in favour of one view rather than the other.
Fortunately for the Mental View, there is an argument that can be offered
in its defence. This argument appeals to the idea that consent is an exercise
of an individual’s autonomy.⁴ In this context, we should conceive of auton-
omy as a capacity for moral self-governance.⁵ So conceived, our autonomy
partly consists in our ability to control our moral boundaries. Hurd (1996:
124–5) invokes this conception of autonomy to argue as follows:

If autonomy resides in the ability to will the alteration of moral rights and
duties, and if consent is normative significant precisely because it consti-
tutes an expression of autonomy, then it must be the case that to consent is
to exercise the will. That is, it must be the case that consent constitutes a
subjective mental state.

In this way, Hurd argues that we should accept the Mental View on the
grounds that consent is an expression of autonomy.
Hurd’s argument is not persuasive because it overlooks the fact that our
behaviour is also an expression of our autonomy. For example, we express
our autonomy by communicating with other people. If a version of the

sexual activity. For other appeals to cases of non-communicated consent in support of the
Behavioural View, see Den Hartogh (2011: 301); Owens (2012: 571).
⁴ Some people are skeptical about the connection between consent and common conceptions
of autonomy (Manson & O’Neill 2007: 16–22, 69–72).
⁵ In addition to conceiving of autonomy as a capacity, ethicists have developed other
conceptions of autonomy. For example, scholars have developed accounts of what it is to be
an autonomous agent, accounts of what it is to make a choice autonomously, and accounts of
the value of autonomy. For helpful overviews of the literature on autonomy, see Killmister
(2018); Stoljar (2018); Christman (2018); Buss & Westlund (2018).
26   

Behavioural View states that consent requires intentional behaviour, then

this version of the view also entails that consent is an expression of our
autonomy. Therefore, the assumption that consent is an expression of
our autonomy does not favour the Mental View over the Behavioural View.
Instead, a more controversial assumption is needed to motivate the
Mental View over the Behavioural View. To see what is needed, let us
consider Kimberly Kessler Ferzan’s (2016: 405) argument:

if we think that what we are protecting is autonomy, then that autonomy is

best respected by recognising that the consenter has it within his or her
power to allow the boundary crossing simply by so choosing. No expres-
sion is needed.

Here Ferzan assumes that the correct view of consent best respects auton-
omy. This raises the question what it is for a conception of consent to ‘best
respect’ autonomy. To reach the conclusion that the Mental View is correct,
Ferzan’s argument requires the assumption that consent is constituted by
whatever is maximally within our autonomous control. This assumption
would provide us with reasons to favour the Mental View over the
Behavioural View. To engage in physical behaviour, we need cooperation
from the world around us. For example, we can communicate with other
people only if they can interpret what we are saying. By contrast, to exercise
our mental capacities, we need only an external environment in which we
can think. Assuming that we have functioning mental capacities, the exercise
of these capacities is entirely within our control. Since the Mental View
implies that the exercise of our mental capacities determines how we alter
our normative boundaries, the Mental View entails that we have as much
control as possible over these boundaries.
We can fortify this motivation for the Mental View by considering how
someone’s consent can determine whether they are wronged by another
person’s behaviour. Along these lines, Ferzan connects consent with griev-
ances. Ferzan (2016: 406) claims that ‘an individual is not wronged, and does
not experience conduct as a wrong, when willed acquiescence is present’.
I take Ferzan’s idea to be that in these contexts it should be up to the
individual whether or not they are wronged by another person. To see
why this idea is attractive, consider an action that could potentially wrong
an individual by infringing their rights. It is tempting to think that if the
individual makes up their mind that they are wronged by this action, then
they are wronged by it. And it is tempting to think that if the individual
     ? 27

makes up their mind that they are not wronged by the action, then they are
not wronged by it. This would be to see the individual’s thoughts as
determining whether they are wronged by the action. If the individual’s
consent to the action consists in their thoughts, then their thoughts deter-
mine whether they are wronged by the action.

2.2 What Type of Mental Attitude?

The Autonomy Argument also has implications for the question of which
mental attitude constitutes consent. For example, is this a desire, choice, or
intention?
By now, scholars have reached a consensus that consent does not consist
in desire.⁶ We might have been tempted to focus on desires because, in
sexual encounters, people should be attentive to whether their partners want
to have sex. Similarly, in these encounters, people’s conscious thoughts are
often about how much they want to have sex with another person. However,
there is a significant problem with identifying consent with desire.
According to the Autonomy Argument, consent should be under our
intentional control. Yet we do not control what we desire. Compare these
cases:

Invitation/Desire. Your friend has not thought about whether to invite you
over to their house. As it happens, their desire to invite you is stronger than
their desire not to invite you.
Invitation/Choice. Your friend has the same desires as they have in the
Invitation Desire case. In addition, your friend deliberates about whether to
invite you and decides to do so.

In the Invitation/Desire case, your friend has not exercised any control over
whether you come to their house, as they do not control what their desires
are. However, in the Invitation/Choice case, your friend has exercised con-
trol over their decision to invite you. Accordingly, if an advocate of the
Mental View accepts the Autonomy Argument, then they should say that

⁶ At one point, Peter Westen (2004: 32) maintains that ‘factual attitudinal consent can be
conceptualised—and, I believe, ought to be conceptualised—as consisting invariably of mental
states of desire alone’. Elsewhere, Westen (2004) theorizes consent in terms of choices. For
critical discussion of Westen on this point, see (Ferzan 2006: 204–7).
28   

your friend consents in the Invitation/Choice case, but not in the Invitation/
Desire case. Therefore, they should deny that a mere desire is sufficient for
consent.
Rather than thinking of consent in terms of desire, some scholars think of
consent as a mental act like a choice or decision. For example, Ferzan (2006:
206) claims that ‘what ultimately matters is not that one has a desire but that
one chooses to act based on that desire. The desire does not do the work —
the choice does.’⁷ This idea is promising, but it cannot be quite right. In
order for consent to make an action permissible, the consent-giver must still
be consenting to the action at the time that the action takes place. To
illustrate this point, compare the following two cases:

Car/Constant. At 10 a.m., Parent decides that Teenager may use the family
car at 7 p.m. At 7 p.m., Parent is still willing for Teenager to use the car.
Teenager uses the car at 7 p.m.
Car/Change. At 10 a.m., Parent decides that Teenager may use the family
car at 7 p.m. By 7 p.m., Parent has changed their mind and is no longer
willing for Teenager to use the car. Teenager uses the car at 7 p.m.

Teenager uses the car with Parent’s consent only in Car/Constant. It is not
enough that Parent had previously made a choice to let Teenager use the car
in Car/Change. In addition, Parent’s willingness must persist through to the
time at which Teenager uses the car. However, Parent’s choices do not
persist in this way. Like other mental acts, choices are events. Events have
finite durations. In the above cases, Parent’s choices terminated at 10 a.m.
To respond to this point, an advocate of the Mental View could take the
position that someone consents if they have made a choice and subsequently
have not made the opposite choice. This position still holds that facts about
consent consist in facts about choices. However, this position does not
account for the ways that people’s minds can change without making
choices. Consider:

⁷ In later work, Ferzan (2016: 406) follows Westen in claiming that consent is ‘an act of willed
acquiescence’. Ferzan (2016: 398) clarifies this by claiming that this involves ‘an internal choice
to allow contact—a decision that “this is okay with me” ’. Along similar lines, Alexander (1996:
166) holds that ‘when one consents to what would otherwise be a boundary-crossing act of
another, one chooses to forgo or waive one’s moral objection to the boundary crossing . . . To
consent is to form the intention to forgo one’s moral complaint against another’s act.’ In later
work, Alexander (2014: 108) states that consent consists in ‘waiving one’s right to object—or, if
that sounds too much like a non-mental action, that of mentally accepting without objection
another’s crossing one’s moral or legal boundary (the boundary that defines one’s rights)’.
     ? 29

Car/Forgetful. At 10 a.m., Parent decides that Teenager may use the family
car at 7 p.m. By 7 p.m., Parent has forgotten that they have made this
decision and no longer intends to permit Teenager to use the car.
Consequently, at 7 p.m. Parent is unwilling for Teenager to use the car.
Teenager uses the car at 7 p.m.

In Car/Forgetful, Parent’s mind has changed even though they never make a
choice that is opposite to the choice that they made at 10 a.m. If we take the
Autonomy Argument seriously, then we should deny that Teenager has
Parent’s consent at 7 p.m. This is because at 7 p.m. Parent is unwilling for
Teenager to use the car. If Parent’s consent is maximally within their
autonomous control, and Parent is unwilling for Teenager to use the car at
7 p.m., then Parent does not consent at 7 p.m.
Rather than identifying consent with a choice, an advocate of the Mental
View should identify consent with an intention.⁸ There is an important
connection between choices and intentions: one normally forms an inten-
tion by making a choice. However, intentions and choices belong to different
ontological categories. Choices are mental events, while intentions are
mental states. Because intentions are mental states, Parent’s intentions can
persist through to the time at which Teenager uses the car.⁹ This explains
why Parent consents at Car/Constant. In that case, at 7 p.m. Parent still
intends to let Teenager use the car. This also explains why Parent does not
consent in Car/Change or Car/Forgetful. In those cases, at 7 p.m. Parent no
longer intends to let Teenager use the car.
The view that consent consists in intentions has been objected to by
Victor Tadros (2016: 205):

Some mental phenomena are states of mind: intentions, beliefs, desires,

and so on. But we also perform mental actions—forming intentions and
beliefs, deciding, choosing, and so on. Those who think that consent can be
given without outward behaviour thus need not hold the implausible view

⁸ For a version of the Mental view that conceives of consent in terms of intentions, see Hurd
(1996: 126–38).
⁹ For discussion of the difference between mental events and mental states, see Steward
(1997). Desires are also mental states, but Michael Bratman (1982) has shown that intentions
are different from desires. While desires are the inputs to our practical deliberation, intentions
are among the outputs of our deliberation. In the Invitation/Desire case, your friend has not yet
deliberated about whether to invite you over for dinner, and so they have not formed an
intention to invite you. In the Invitation/Choice case, your friend has concluded this deliberation
by making a choice. By making this choice, they form an intention to invite you.
30   

that consenting is reducible to certain desires or intentions. They may

believe that it is a mental action, similar to the action of deciding or
choosing.

This is not a compelling objection to the view that consent consists in

intentions, as Tadros simply asserts that the view is ‘implausible’ without
giving us any reason to think that the view is implausible. Moreover, Tadros
allows that forming an intention is a mental action. On that assumption, an
advocate of the intention view can agree that consent is initiated by a mental
action. Nonetheless, the advocate of the intention view can maintain their
position that the consent is reducible to the intention. This position is more
plausible than Tadros’s. An individual’s consent persists even when the
individual has completed the relevant mental action. That is because the
consent consists in the intention that is formed by that mental action.
Tadros’s objection goes wrong by mistaking the beginning of the consent
with the consent itself.

2.3 Assessing the Autonomy Argument

It is clear from our preceding discussion why the Mental View provides
an individual with control over their normative boundaries. But to deter-
mine whether this consideration gives us powerful reasons to accept the
Mental View over the Behavioural View, we need to consider the amount of
autonomous control offered by the Behavioural View.
Interestingly, defenders of the Behavioural View have also appealed to
autonomy to motivate their view. For example, Seana Shiffrin (2008: 500)
holds that someone makes promises and gives consent through the ‘exercise
and expression of her will alone’. Since Shiffrin holds that consent requires
expressing one’s will, Shiffrin denies that a mental attitude is sufficient for
consent. In that respect, Shiffrin rejects the Mental View of consent.
However, since Shiffrin holds that consent requires exercising one’s will,
Shiffrin agrees that a mental attitude is necessary for consent. Shiffrin argues
that this idea is ‘part and parcel with any plausible conception of an
autonomous agent’. As Shiffrin (2008: 502) elaborates, if someone were
unable to give consent, then they would have unwaivable rights, which:

would render (morally) impossible real forms of meaningful human rela-

tionships and the full definition and recognition of the self (not to mention
     31

making medical and dental care cumbersome, dangerous, and awfully

painful). To forge meaningful relationships, embodied human beings
must have the ability to interact within the same physical space, to share
the use of property, and to touch one another. They must therefore be able
to empower particular people.

By emphasizing moral impossibility, Shiffrin is pointing out that it is not

enough that someone has the physical ability to interact in various ways. To
interact in morally healthy ways, this person must have the ability to make
these interactions permissible by giving consent.
So both defenders of the Behavioural View and the Mental View have
appealed to autonomy to motivate their views. Earlier, we noted that the
Mental View has a comparative advantage in the respect that it entails that
we have more autonomous control over whether we consent than the
Behavioural View does. To evaluate the size of this advantage, we need to
determine how much more control the Mental View gives us. To that end,
we should distinguish two types of control that we can have over our consent
(Wertheimer 2003). First, we can have the negative ability to ensure that we
do not consent when we intend not to consent:

Negative autonomy is defined as the capacity to ensure that one is not

validly consenting.

Second, we can have the correlative ability to ensure that we are consenting
when we intend to consent:

Positive autonomy is defined as the capacity to ensure that one is validly

consenting.

Both capacities are maximized by the most plausible version of the Mental
View, which holds that a certain intention is necessary and sufficient for
consent. From now on, I will have this version in mind when I talk, for
brevity, of the Mental View.
When it comes to positive autonomy, the Mental View has an advantage
over the Behavioural View. According to the Mental View, a consent-giver
can control whether they consent simply by controlling whether they have a
certain intention. But according to the Behavioural View, an individual must
also engage in some form of behaviour to give consent. If an individual
cannot engage in this behaviour, then the Behavioural View implies that the
32   

individual cannot consent. This would be a limit to the individual’s positive

autonomy. How large is this limit to their autonomy? This question will be
answered differently by different versions of the Behavioural View. For
example, consider a demanding version of the Behavioural View, according
to which someone consents only if the consent-receiver successfully inter-
prets the consent. This demanding version implies that the consent-giver’s
positive autonomy is limited whenever the consent-giver cannot control
how they are interpreted (Tadros 2016: 207). By contrast, consider an
undemanding version of the Behavioural View, which does not require
that a consent-receiver must be aware of the consent. This undemanding
version implies the consent-giver’s positive autonomy is limited to a lesser
extent. The Mental View has only a slender advantage over this undemand-
ing version of the Behavioural View when it comes to positive autonomy.
The version of the Behavioural View that I will eventually endorse—the
Expression of Will View—is a relatively undemanding version of the
Behavioural View.
When it comes to negative autonomy, the picture is more nuanced. There
are two parts to an individual’s capacity for negative autonomy. On the one
hand, negative autonomy partly involves the ability to avoid consenting in
the first place. On the other hand, negative autonomy also partly involves
the ability to revoke consent that has previously been given.
The Mental View maximizes an individual’s ability to avoid giving con-
sent in the first place. However, some versions of the Behavioural View
similarly maximize the individual’s ability to avoid giving consent in the first
place. This ability is maximized by any version of the Behavioural View that
posits the following necessary condition: someone consents only if they
engage in deliberate behaviour. This necessary condition implies that some-
one can avoid giving consent by refraining from this deliberate behaviour.
This necessary condition is endorsed by the accounts that we will consider as
rivals to the Mental Account. These are the Successful Communication
Account and the Evidential Account. As I will formulate these accounts,
both accounts endorse the claim that someone must engage in deliberate
behaviour to give consent.¹⁰ Therefore, with respect to one’s ability to avoid
giving consent in the first place, the Mental Account has no advantage over
the Successful Communication Account and the Evidential Account.

¹⁰ For a view that denies this claim, see Bolinger (2019).

     33

With respect to revoking consent, the Mental View unambiguously

ensures that revoking consent is in each individual’s control. This is because
the Mental View implies that someone revokes their consent just by changing
their mind. What does the Behavioural View imply about revoking consent?
Again, this question will be answered differently by different versions of the
Behavioural View. According to one version of the Behavioural View, an
individual must engage in behaviour to withdraw their consent. According to
this version of the Behavioural View, if the individual is paralysed and
consequently cannot engage in this behaviour, then they cannot withdraw
their consent. However, this result can be avoided by other versions of the
Behavioural View. For example, a different version of the Behavioural View
claims that someone continues to consent only if they still have a certain
mental attitude. By requiring this mental attitude as a necessary condition for
the persistence of consent, this version of the Behavioural View implies that
someone revokes their consent when they no longer have the relevant mental
attitude. Therefore, this version of the Behavioural View implies that some-
one has just as much control over revoking their consent as the Mental
View does.
To sum up, it is fair to say that the Mental View has an advantage over the
Behavioural View when it comes to securing an individual’s autonomous
control over whether they consent. Still, it is important not to exaggerate the
size of this comparative advantage. The size of the advantage varies with
different versions of the Behavioural View. Some versions of the Behavioural
View are undemanding about the behaviour that is required for consent. For
example, some versions of the Behavioural View do not require that the
consent-giver has made the consent-receiver aware of the consent.
An undemanding version of the Behavioural View makes it easy for some-
one to give consent. To the extent that it is easy for someone to give consent,
their consent is more within their control. Admittedly, undemanding ver-
sions of the Behavioural View still imply that someone cannot consent if
they are unable to engage in any physical behaviour. An example would be a
case in which someone is paralysed. However, a case like this is rare. In most
actual cases, a consent-giver can perform the requisite behaviour. This
means that considerations of autonomy offer only a modest advantage for
the Mental View over an undemanding version of the Behavioural View.
Another reason why this advantage is modest is that it is unclear why we
should assume that an individual has maximal control over whether they
consent. We have just seen that undemanding versions of the Behavioural
View imply that an individual has a robust degree of control over whether
34   

they consent. We saw that, for the Autonomy Argument to motivate the
Mental View over the Behavioural View, the argument requires the contro-
versial assumption that an individual has maximal control rather than
robust control. That assumption is questionable, and I am not aware of
any defence that has been offered for this assumption. This assumption
cannot be motivated simply by noting that there is an important connection
between consent and autonomy. This connection is secured by the uncon-
troversial assumption that an individual has a robust degree of control over
whether they consent. That uncontroversial assumption is consistent with
endorsing the Behavioural View.

2.4 Summary

By giving consent, an individual exercises autonomy over how others may

act in their personal domain (Section 2.1). Suppose that we should adopt
whichever conception of consent gives an individual as much autonomy as
possible in this regard. Since an individual has more control over their
thoughts than their behaviour, this assumption suggests that we should
conceive of consent as consisting solely in the individual’s mental attitudes.
This is the Autonomy Argument.
If we follow this link between consent and autonomy, then this leads us to a
view of the mental attitude that consent consists in (Section 2.2). This is the
view that consent consists in an attitude that is tied to our will. Both a choice
and an intention are tied to our will. Choices and intentions are importantly
connected because people form intentions by making choices. But choices are
events, and intentions are mental states. Since people continue to consent
even after the choice is over, the most plausible version of the Mental View
identifies consent with an intention that is formed by the choice.
The Autonomy Argument gives the Mental View only a modest advan-
tage over the Behavioural View (Section 2.3). The Behavioural View ensures
that a consent-giver has a robust degree of autonomy over whether they
consent. To favour the Mental View over the Behavioural View on the basis
of autonomy, we must make the controversial assumption that a conception
of consent must give us as much autonomy as possible. However, it is not
obvious why we should make this controversial assumption. We could
instead make the uncontroversial assumption that a conception of consent
should give us a robust amount of autonomy. That uncontroversial assump-
tion is consistent with the Behavioural View.
 3
The Permissive Intention Principle

In the Introduction, we noted that the scope of consent matters for sexual
deception: a victim of deception can unwittingly take part in a sexual
encounter that falls outside the scope of their consent. The scope of consent
also matters for other forms of sexual misconduct. Consider the testimony
of Martha Nussbaum (2016), who recalls, ‘I certainly intended to consent to
intercourse. What I did not consent to was the gruesome, violent, and
painful assault that he substituted for intercourse.’ Here Nussbaum is
making the point that consent to one form of sexual activity does not entail
consent to any form of sexual activity. While a benign sexual encounter fell
within the scope of Nussbaum’s consent, the actual violent assault did not.
Moreover, Nussbaum gestures at what sets the boundaries of the scope of
their consent. Nussbaum suggests that this is fixed by what they intended to
consent to. This fits with the idea that a sexual encounter is non-consensual
in virtue of being against someone’s will.
In this chapter, we will discuss a principle that implies that someone’s
intentions determine the scope of their consent. In Section 3.1, we will see
that the Autonomy Argument has implications for the scope of consent. In
Section 3.2, we will see that an advocate of the Mental View should not
identify consent with intentions that have descriptive contents. In
Section 3.3, we will see that an advocate of the Mental View should instead
identify someone’s consent with their ‘permissive intentions’. Roughly, these
are intentions to permit another person’s actions. This leads us to the
‘Permissive Intention Principle’ for the scope of consent.

3.1 Mental Content and the Scope of Consent

Why does the Autonomy Argument have implications for the scope of
consent? Because there is little value to controlling whether one gives
consent, unless one simultaneously controls what one gives consent to.
Accordingly, we can appeal to autonomy not only to defend a view of

The Scope of Consent. Tom Dougherty, Oxford University Press (2021). © Tom Dougherty.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894793.003.0004
36    

what consent is, but also a principle for the scope of consent. Along these
lines, I once argued that:

rights are intimately linked to our autonomy and agency. They mark out
personal realms over which we have exclusive control, and our decisions
determine exactly what may permissibly happen within these realms.
Having these personal realms is crucial to our leading our lives in the
ways that we should like. Fundamentally, this generates duties in other
people to respect our wills: they must respect the choices that we make
about what shall happen within these realms. If our choices are to max-
imally determine the permissibility of others’ actions, then the rights that
we waive must be the rights that we intend to waive.
(Dougherty 2013: 734–5)

Since consent waives rights, I was defending a view of consent’s scope: the
consent-giver’s intentions determine which actions are normatively affected
by their consent. My reason was that consent should manifest the consent-
giver’s autonomy. This is the key idea behind the Autonomy Argument.
A similar point arises with the strand of the Autonomy Argument that
concerns an individual’s grievances. In Chapter 2, we looked at two related
ideas. The first idea is that someone is not wronged by an action if they are
willing to permit the action. The second idea is that someone is wronged by
an action if they are unwilling to permit the action and their consent is
needed for the action. These ideas also support the idea that the scope of
consent is grounded in the contents of the consent-giver’s intentions.
Consider a particular action for which an agent needs an individual’s
consent. Suppose that this action is against the individual’s will. According
to the grievances strand of the Autonomy Argument, it follows that the
individual is wronged by this action. Therefore, the action would fall
outside the scope of their consent. Now suppose that the action is not
against the individual’s will. According to the grievances strand of the
Autonomy Argument, it then follows that the agent does not wrong the
individual by performing the action. Therefore, the action falls within the
scope of the individual’s consent. Joining the dots, the grievances strand of
the Autonomy Argument implies that the scope of someone’s consent is
determined by which actions are against their will.
Thus, the Autonomy Argument does not just support the view that
consent consists in intentions. The argument also supports a principle for
the scope of consent. According to this principle, the scope is determined by
     37

the contents of these intentions. Since the words ‘scope’ and ‘content’ may
seem similar, let me clarify the senses that these terms have in our discus-
sion. The scope of consent concerns the normative effects of the consent.
The content of an intention is a descriptive feature of someone’s psychology.
Therefore, this principle for the scope of consent implies that certain
normative effects are grounded in certain features of consent-givers’
psychologies.
To make this principle precise, we need to say more about the contents of
these intentions. But we can already get the gist of how the principle governs
the scope of consent. To apply this principle to any case, we should consider
which actions are against the consent-giver’s will. For example, the principle
would imply that Taylor is allowed to use Ashley’s en suite bathroom if and
only if Ashley using the bathroom is not against Taylor’s will.

3.2 Intentions with Descriptive Contents

To come up with a precise principle for the scope of consent, we need to

develop the Mental Account so that it takes a stance on the particular
intentions that consent consists in. Which intentions would these be?
One answer is Heidi Hurd’s (1996). Hurd claims that to consent to
another person’s action is to intend that they perform this action. For
example, Hurd’s view is that when you consent to another person using
your pen, you are intending that this person uses your pen. Admittedly, this
person’s action is not your own action. Still, Hurd (1996: 130) argues that
you can intend states of affairs that are not your own actions. For example,
Hurd claims that you can intend another person’s death. However, Hurd
anticipates that some people will not be comfortable with the idea that you
can intend another person’s actions. Consequently, Hurd offers the alterna-
tive proposal that you consent to someone performing an action by intend-
ing to causally contribute to this person performing the action.
This is a view according to which consent consists in intentions with
descriptive contents. By this, I mean that we can specify the contents of the
intentions using only descriptive terms. In other words, we do not need to
use normative terms to specify these contents. For example, on Hurd’s view,
you consent to someone touching your arm in virtue of intending that this
person touches your arm. The content of your intention is the proposition
that this person touches your arm. This is a descriptive proposition, as we do
not need to use a term like ‘permit’ to express the proposition.
38    

There are two reasons why we must reject Hurd’s view. The first reason to
reject Hurd’s view is that it incorrectly specifies the necessary conditions for
consent. Hurd’s view implies that intending someone’s action is a necessary
condition of consenting to this action. However, this is not a necessary
condition for consent. It is possible to consent to someone’s action without
intending that they perform this action. For example, you may be indifferent
whether someone uses your pen. If you are indifferent, then you neither
intend that they use the pen nor intend that they do not use the pen. Even if
you have no intentions one way or the other, you could still give this person
permission to use the pen. For another counterexample to Hurd’s necessary
condition, consider an adapted case of Victor Tadros’s (2016: 209):

Car/Truancy. Teenager has been skipping school and driving the family
car. Intending to get Teenager to choose to go to school, Parent says, ‘I am
not okay with you skipping school and driving around—it bothers me a lot
as your parent. Still, I want you to attend out of your own free will. So I am
releasing you from your duty not to use the car. But my expectation is that
you will respond maturely and decide to attend school.’

Parent intends that Teenager does not use the car. However, Parent consents
to Teenager using the car. Therefore, intending Teenager to use the car is not
a necessary condition for consenting to Teenager using the car.¹
The second reason to reject Hurd’s view is that it incorrectly specifies the
sufficient conditions for consent. Hurd’s view implies that intending some-
one’s action is sufficient for consenting to this action. However, this is not a
sufficient condition for consent. It is possible to intend that someone
performs an action without consenting to this action. For example, someone
might intend to entrap another person in wrongful activity (Den Hartogh
2011: 301; Tadros 2016: 210). Consider:

Entrapment. Bully says that they will smash Enemy’s garden gnome, come
hell or high water. Enemy says to Bully, ‘I believe that you will do this, but
I am not going to be intimidated into locking my gnome in my shed.
Instead, I have set up CCTV to catch you wrongfully smashing my gnome

¹ Similarly, David Owens (2011: 412–3) notes that you could consent to someone’s action in
order to prevent them from performing this action. Suppose that you know that if you do not
invite your enemy to your party, then they will attend to ruin your party. You also know that if
you invite your enemy, then they will snub you by not attending. To prevent your enemy from
coming to the party, you invite them.
   39

without my consent. I will use this evidence against you.’ Enemy knows
that this warning will not deter Bully.

Enemy does not consent to Bully smashing their gnome. Yet Enemy chooses
to leave the gnome outside, with the intention that Bully smashes the gnome.
Therefore, intending Bully to smash the gnome is not sufficient for consent-
ing to Bully smashing the gnome.

3.3 Permissive Intentions

To avoid the problems with Hurd’s view, an advocate of the Mental View
should claim that someone’s consent consists in an intention with a norma-
tive content. Since the effect of this consent is to release another person from
a duty, this would be an intention to release that person from a duty. I will
call this type of intention a ‘permissive intention’. We can then state a
principle for the scope of consent as follows:

Permissive Intention Principle (Draft). An action A falls within the scope

of the consent that X gives to Y if and only if X intends to release Y from
their duty not to perform A.²

This formulation is a draft because it needs a qualification that we will

shortly introduce.
Why should an advocate of the Mental Account adopt the Permissive
Intention Principle? There are two key reasons that people may have. The
first reason is that the principle resonates with the common view that
consent is a normative power to intentionally change one’s moral relation-
ships with others. According to this view, one releases another person from a
duty not to perform an action by intending to release them from this duty.

² For a defence of a principle for consent’s scope along these lines, see Dougherty (2013:
734–5); Manson (2018). Similarly, Alexander (1996: 166) claims that to ‘consent is to form the
intention to forgo one’s moral complaint against another’s act’. See also Alexander (2014: 108).
Less precisely, Ferzan (2016) claims that consenting to an action involves deciding that this
action is ‘okay with’ the consent-giver. Because Ferzan’s view is imprecise, it gets the wrong
result with the Car/Truancy case. Parent consents to Teenager using the car even though Parent
is explicit that they are not okay with Teenager using the car. A similar problem confronts
Alexander Guerrero’s (forthcoming) view that consent involves ‘affirmative endorsement’ of
some state of affairs. There is a clear sense in which Parent is not affirmatively endorsing
Teenager’s use of the car. Accordingly, Guerrero would need to specify the particular type of
affirmative endorsement that consent consists in.
Another random document with
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rechtstreeks betrekking hebben. Dit is eveneens het geval met het
voor Friesche namenvorschers allerbelangrijkste hoofdstuk over
Zaansche Eigennamen, voorkomende in het werk van Dr. G. J.
Boekenoogen, De Zaansche Volkstaal, Leiden, 1897. Eindelijk
bevat het werk Nomina geographica Neerlandica, Amsterdam, 1882
en vervolgens, nog eenige opstellen, door mij geschreven, over
Friesche [199]plaatsnamen, en in het bijzonder eene uitvoerige, en
leerrijk toegelichte lijst van oude Friesche plaatsnamen, tegelijk eene
bijdrage tot de oude aardrijkskunde van Friesland, geschreven door
Dr. F. Buitenrust Hettema. Het laatst verschenen werk op Friesch
naamkundig gebied is mijne Friesche Naamlijst (Onomasticon
frisicum) Leeuwarden, 1898, eene volledige, stelselmatig geordende
en beredeneerde lijst van Friesche eigennamen, zoo mans- en
vrouwen-vóórnamen als geslachts- en plaatsnamen, in hunnen
onderlingen samenhang en met toelichtingen voorgesteld.

Ook mogen hier niet onvermeld blijven drie werken van Oost- en
Wezer-Friezen; namelijk een van Bernh. Brons Jr., Friesische
Namen und Mittheilungen darüber, Emden, 1877, dat uitvoerige
lijsten van Friesche eigennamen bevat, hoofdzakelijk uit Oost-
Friesland; een van Dr. Karl Strackerjan, Die Jeverländischen
Personennamen mit Berücksichtigung der Ortsnamen, Jever, 1864,
’t welk van groote geleerdheid en navorschingsijver getuigt. En
eindelijk een opstel van Aug. Lübben, Einiges über Friesische
Namen, voorkomende in Haupt’s Zeitschrift für Deutsches
Alterthum, 1856.

Ten slotte moet hier nog genoemd worden een boek, waarin ook de
Friesche namen en naamsvormen bijzonderlijk behandeld worden
(in het hoofdstuk Ueber besondere Friesische Namensformen und
Verkürzungen); namelijk Dr. Franz Stark, Die Kosenamen der
Germanen, Weenen, 1868. In dit werk worden de eigenaardige
algemeen Germaansche en bijzonder Friesche vleivormen der
oorspronkelijk volledige namen duidelijk in het licht gesteld.

Evenmin als de Friesche taal, oudtijds geenszins, en ook heden ten

dage nog niet, uitsluitend eigen was en is aan Friesland tusschen
Flie en Lauwers, zoo min zijn ook de Friesche eigennamen, uit die
taal voortgesproten, uitsluitend beperkt tot dat hedendaagsche
Nederlandsche gewest Friesland. Integendeel. Immers komen ze
eveneens voor, zij het dan soms ook in min of meer gewijzigde
vormen, in de andere Oud-Friesche gouwen, dus in West-Friesland
(noordelijk Noord-Holland), Groningerland, Oost-Friesland, Wezer-
Friesland, Noord-Friesland, enz. Evenwel, gelijk de Friesche taal in
het Nederlandsche gewest Friesland nog heden, als van ouds, hare
grootste ontwikkeling, [200]ook hare grootste zuiverheid, eigenheid en
waarde, en tevens hare grootste verbreiding heeft, meer dan in de
andere gouwen, zoo zijn ook in dat Nederlandsche Friesland de
Friesche eigennamen het menigvuldigst en het bijzonderst in hunne
vormen, ook het meest verspreid en het meest in gebruik, van ouds
her en nog heden ten dage.

Oudtijds, toen de Friesche taal in hare eigenheden, in hare eigene

klanken en eigene vormen, en in de eigene plaats die zij inneemt
tusschen de talen der andere volken, weinig of ook in het geheel niet
bekend was bij de geleerden buiten Friesland, en veel minder nog bij
de ongeleerden, heeft men wel gemeend, en dit ook verkondigd, dat
de bijzonderheden der Friesche namen slechts te verklaren waren
door aan te nemen dat die namen van Hebreeuwschen, van
Trojaanschen, van Griekschen of van Romeinschen oorsprong
moesten wezen. Dit behoeft heden ten dage geene wederlegging
meer. Maar dat de Friesche namen zuiver Germaansch zijn, en in
hun oorspronkelijk wezen niet verschillen van de namen der andere
Germaansche volken, dit is nog geenszins van algemeene, en nog
geenszins van voldoende bekendheid. De waarheid echter dezer
stelling blijkt ruimschoots, en wel in de eerste plaats uit die Friesche
mans- en vrouwenvóórnamen, die nog hunne volledige, of anders
slechts weinig ingekorte, slechts weinig versletene, oorspronkelijke
vormen vertoonen; bij voorbeeld, de mansnamen A d g e r (voluit
A l d g a r ), A d s e r , A e l d e r t , in Nederlandsche spelling
A a l d e r t , oorspronkelijk voluit A d e l h a r t 2, enz. allen nog
hedendaags gebruikelijke [201]namen. Uit de oude en verouderde,
hedendaags bij de Friezen reeds uitgestorvene namen blijkt dit
eveneens; bij voorbeeld, uit A d e l b a l d (in versleten vorm A l b a d ,
A l b e t ), A d e l b r i c , A d e l d a g , A d e l r i c , A l d g r i m 3, enz.
En niet minder uit de vrouwennamen, zoo hedendaagsche
(A e l t s j e , in Nederlandsche spelling A a l t j e , de ingekorte en
verkleinvorm van A e l h e y t of A d e l h e i d )—A e l m o e d , in
Nederlandsche spelling A a l m o e d , oorspronkelijk voluit
A d e l m o d ,—A e r l a n d , in Nederlandsche spelling A a r l a n d 4;
als verouderde (A d e l g a r d e , A d e l b u r g , A d e l h a r d a ) 5,
enz.

Dit zijn allen echt Germaansche namen, die in de zelfde of [202]in

nagenoeg gelijke vormen aan alle andere Germaansche volken ook
eigen zijn. Wel vertoonen enkelen dezer namen sommige bijzonder-
Friesche eigenaardigheden, maar hun karakter van algemeen-
Germaansche namen gaat daardoor geenszins verloren. Sommigen
van deze namen, A l b e r t , E v e r t , F o l k e r t , L a m m e r t ,
W i l l e m zijn evenzeer algemeen-Nederlandsch als bijzonder-
Friesch eigendom. Opmerkelijk is het betrekkelijk veelvuldig
voorkomen van namen met bern samengesteld, bij de mannen:
Bernolf, Bernlef, Gerbern, Hellingbern,
H e r b e r n , L i o b b r e n (H l i o d b e r n ), O l b r e n , R e i n b e r n ,
R i c b e r n , R o d b e r n , S y b r e n (S i g b e r n ), U l b e r n ,
W y b r e n (W i g b e r n ), enz.; bij de vrouwen, met land en ou
samengesteld: A l a n d en E l a n d , G e r l a n d , Y s l a n t ,
U b l a n t —B e r n o u , E d o u , F e r d o u , F o l k o u , G a d o u ,
J i l d o u , M e i n o u , R e i n o u , R i k o u , enz. Sommigen van
deze volledige namen zijn door afslijting en inkorting bijna onkenbaar
geworden. Als zoodanigen zijn hier voren reeds vermeld A l e m ,
F r e a r k , G e l f , G r e a l t , H a t t e m , J e l m e r, J o r r i t ,
Ts j a l f , enz. Andere soortgelijken zijn nog S j o e r d (S i g u r d ),
S i e r k of S j i r k (S i g r i k ), Ts j e r k (T h i a d r i k , T h e o d o r i k ,
—Volkrijk—de zelfde naam als D i e t r i c h in ’t Hoogduitsch,
D i e d e r i k of D i r k in ’t Nederduitsch), Ts j a e r d , Ts j e a r d ,
Searp, Worp, Merk, Murk, Sjuk, Jarich, Gjalt,
Ts j e r n e , O r k , enz. Deze soort van namen heeft almede aan de
Friesche namen in ’t algemeen dien eigenen stempel verleend,
waardoor ze zoo bijzonder, schijnbaar zoo geheel eenig zijn onder
de namen der andere Germaansche volken.

De vleivormen der namen, zoo overrijk onder de Friesche namen

vertegenwoordigd, hebben almede eenen zeer bijzonderen stempel
op die namen gedrukt. Die vleinamen worden verder in deze
verhandeling nader behandeld en verklaard.

De Friesche vrouwennamen—behalve die welke reeds op de vorige

bladzijde zijn vermeld, en nog een honderdtal andere dergelijken—
de Friesche vrouwennamen zijn in den regel rechtstreeks van de
mansnamen afgeleid, door achtervoeging van verkleinende
uitgangen. Het vormen, het afleiden, op deze wijze, van
vrouwennamen uit mansnamen, ofschoon ook bij andere
Germaansche volken voorkomende, is toch bij [203]geen van dezen
zoo algemeen in gebruik als bij de Friezen. Het grootste gedeelte
der Friesche vrouwennamen bestaat dus eigenlijk uit mansnamen in
verkleinvorm, soms in eigenaardigen verkleinvorm. Zoo komen van
de mansnamen A l d e r t , D o u w e , M i n n e en O f f e , door
achtervoeging der verkleinende aanhangsels je, tse of tsen, tsje (tje)
en ke, de vrouwennamen A l d e r t s j e (A l d e r t j e ), D o u w t s e n ,
M i n t s j e (M i n t j e ) en O f k e .

Evenzeer als van den volledigen, zij het dan ook ingekorten en
eenigermate verbasterden naam A l d e r t (A d e l h a r t ), van
D o u w e , en van de vleinamen M i n n e en O f f e , zoo zijn ook van
de verkleinnamen die reeds als mansnamen dienst doen, bij
voorbeeld van B a u k e , I b e l e , O e p k e , R i n s e , W y t s e ,
door achtervoeging van weêr andere verkleinvormen vrouwennamen
gemaakt: B a u k j e , J b e l t s j e (Y b e l t j e ), O e p k j e ,
R i n s k e , W y t s k e . Deze namen zijn dus oneigenlijk gevormd, bij
tautologie, door dubbele verkleiningsachtervoegsels. Zulk eene
opeenhooping van verkleinvormen komt zelfs wel voor als
samenkoppeling van drie achtervoegsels; bij voorbeeld: de
vrouwennaam R e i n s k j e , die ontleed wordt in R e i n (dat is de
mansnaam R e i n , inkorting van den eenen of anderen met Rein,
Regin samengestelden volledigen naam—R e i n g e r of
R e g i n g a r , R e i n d e r t of R e g i n h a r t ), in se, ke en je, alle
drie verkleiningsuitgangen, dus Rein-se-ke-je.

Deze liefhebberij der Friezen voor verkleinvormen achter hunne

namen komt ook aan ’t licht bij die vrouwennamen, die uit eenen
oorspronkelijken, volledigen naam bestaan, met een geheel
overtollig, de schoonheid des naams schadend
verkleiningsachtervoegsel; bij voorbeeld: G e r l a n d t s j e
(G e r l a n d j e ) nevens G e r l a n d , S i b r i c h j e nevens S i b r i c h
(S i g b u r g ), W e l m o e d t s j e (in Nederlandsche spelling
W e l m o e d j e ) nevens W e l m o e d , enz.

De namen der menschen staan geworteld in hunne taal. De oude

Israëlieten droegen Hebreeuwsche namen, de oude Grieken en
Romeinen Grieksche en Latijnsche, de oude Germanen
Germaansche namen. Anders gezegd: zij droegen namen die
samengesteld waren uit woorden, welke oorspronkelijk in hunne
volkstalen eene beteekenis hadden, iets beduidden. De
Hebreeuwsche naam A b r a h a m beteekent: vader der menigte,
dus stamvader. [204]De Grieksche naam A n d r e a s beduidt: de
mannelijke, de manhafte. De Latijnsche naam V i c t o r beteekent:
overwinnaar. Zoo ook beduiden de Germaansche namen
E v e r h a r t (E v e r a a r t of E v e r t ), W y b r e n (W i b e r e n ,
W i b e r n , W i g b e r n ), en G o d s s c h a l k (G o s s e ): de man die
een hart of een aard (’t is het zelfde) heeft als een ever of wild zwijn,
het kind des gevechts, en Gods knecht.

De eigenaardigheden van de Friesche taal spiegelen zich af in de

bijzonderheden der Friesche eigennamen. Anders uitgedrukt: de
bijzonderheden der Friesche namen zijn ontstaan uit de
bijzonderheden der Friesche taal. S i e r k of S j i r k bij voorbeeld is
een hedendaagsche Friesche mansvóórnaam, die wel algemeen
voor een bijzondere, eigenaardig Friesche naam zal worden
gehouden. Nogtans is S i e r k van ouds een algemeen
Germaansche naam, zij het dan ook in Frieschen vorm. S i e r k
immers is eene verbastering, bij uitslijting of inkrimping, een
versletene vorm dus, van den oorspronkelijken, vollen vorm
S i g e r i k . Dit S i g e r i k is een samengestelde naam, bestaande uit
de Oud-Friesche, tevens algemeen Oud-Germaansche woorden
sige, overwinning; en rîk of ryk, rijk. Dus is S i g e r i k in
hedendaagsch Nederlandsch overgezet: rijk door overwinning. De
naam is al oud; immers reeds in de vijfde eeuw na Christus droeg
hem een koning der Goten. Dit Oud-Friesche woord sige hadden de
oude Hollanders als zege, nog gebruikelijk in de uitdrukking de zege
behalen, en deel vormende van de woorden zegepraal en
zegevieren. Den Oud-Frieschen mansnaam S i g e r i k hadden de
oude Hollanders als S e g e r i k (Z e g e r ij k ) in gebruik, en de oude
Hoogduitschers als S i e g r i c h . Mannen die Z e g e r i k of
S i e g r i c h heeten, treft men onder de hedendaagsche Hollanders
en Hoogduitschers uiterst weinig of in het geheel niet meer aan.
Maar in den samengetrokken vorm S i e r k is het Oud-Friesche
S i g e r i k nog heden bij de Friezen in volle gebruik gebleven. Zal
men nu beweren: S i e r k is een geheel eigenaardige Friesche
mansvóórnaam? Wel neen! Men moet zeggen: S i e r k is de
hedendaagsche versletene vorm van den vollen, algemeen Oud-
Germaanschen mansnaam S i g e r i k , S e g e r i k , S i e g r i c h .

De hedendaagsche Friesche mansnaam F r e e r k (in Friesche

uitspraak F r j e r k of F r j e a r k ) verkeert in het zelfde geval [205]als
S j i r k of S i e r k . Immers F r e e r k is eene samentrekking van den
vollen vorm F r e d e r i k . Opmerkelijk is het dat de Hollanders met
de andere Nederlanders in het algemeen, met Franschen,
Engelschen, Denen, enz. juist den Frieschen vorm van dezen naam
als F r e d e r i k , Fréderic, F r e d r i k in gebruik hebben. Want in
goed Hollandsch moest de naam F r e d e r i k als V r e d e r ij k luiden
en gespeld worden, omdat hij vrede-rijk, rijk aan of door vrede
beduidt. De oude Hollanders uit de 17e eeuw schreven dezen naam
dan ook wel, juist overeenkomstig hun taaleigen, als V r e e r ij c k .
En de Hoogduitschers hebben dezen zelfden naam, ook in
overeenstemming met hun taaleigen, als F r i e d r i c h . De oude
Hollanders hadden den geheel ingekrompen vorm F r e e r k ook wel
in gebruik. In zuidelijk Holland en in Zeeland gaat men met verkorten
nog wat verder. Die aldaar F r e d e r i k heet wordt in het
dagelijksche leven veelal F r e e k genoemd. Maar dien vorm
F r e e k heeft men dáár niet als schrijfnaam in gebruik genomen,
gelijk de Friezen—eigenlijk ten onrechte—hun vorm F r e e r k zoo
wel schrijven als noemen.—Zal men nu echter zeggen: F r e e r k is
een bijzondere Friesche naam? Neen! F r e e r k is zoo min eigen en
afzonderlijk Friesch, als S i e r k het is, en als G o s s e , B a r t e l e ,
S j a e r d , Ts j e r k , E e l k e , met A a f k e , R e i n t s j e en
M e i n t s j e , S j o e r d t s j e en W y t s k e het zijn. Alle deze namen
en nog honderden anderen, zijn oorspronkelijk algemeen Oud-
Germaansche eigennamen, maar in bijzonder Friesche vormen,
afkortingen, verbasteringen.

Honderden bijzondere namen zijn als mans- en vrouwenvóórnamen

heden ten dage bij de Friezen, zoo wel bij de Nederlandsche Friezen
als bij de Duitsche en Deensche (Oost- en Noord-Friezen), als ook
bij de Friso-sassische mengelstammen van Groningerland, Drente,
Oldenburg en vele andere gouwen in noordwestelijk Duitschland in
gebruik. En al die namen, die men bij al de andere volksstammen
van de lage landen aan de Noordzee te vergeefs zoekt, zijn
oorspronkelijk algemeen Germaansche namen. De oorsprong van
deze namen kan nog heden bij velen duidelijk worden aangetoond.
Maar ook bij velen van deze namen ligt de oorspronkelijke vorm niet
zoo klaarblijkelijk voor de hand, ja schijnt bij een groot aantal in het
geheel niet meer aangewezen [206]te kunnen worden. Nader
onderzoek echter, uitgaande van eenen man die de Oud-Friesche
taal kent en verstaat, die welbelezen en welervaren is in
middeleeuwsche geschriften en oorkonden, kan hier nog veel licht
verspreiden en tot verrassende ontdekkingen leiden.

Wat zoudt Gij, mijn waarde Lezer! wel maken van den mansnaam
S j o e r d ? een naam die algemeen bij de Friezen in gebruik is, en
die heden ten dage als een bijzonder Friesche naam geldt. Dezen
naam immers, of eenen naam die er op gelijkt, vindt men bij geen
enkel ander volk in gebruik—meent Gij? Hij moet dus wel bijzonder
en eigen Friesch zijn!—Toch is dit niet het geval. Wel is de
hedendaagsche vorm slechts den Friezen eigen, maar
d’oorspronkelijke vorm van dezen naam is algemeen Germaansch.
Het Friesche S j o e r d is toch volkomen een en de zelfde naam als
het Hoogduitsche S i e g f r i e d , als het Oud-Hollandsche S i e v e r t
of S i e u w e r t , ’t welk een versletene vorm is van S i e g f e r t ,
S e g e v e r t . Onder den vorm S i e v e r t en S i e u w e r t komt deze
naam nog heden wel in noordelijk Noord-Holland voor. Daar zijn ook
de geslachtsnamen S i e u w e r t s z en S i e w e r t s inheemsch, die
zoon van S i e v e r t beteekenen. S i e v e r t of S i e g f r i e d
beteekent zege-vrede, overwinning door vrede, een naam van
schoone beteekenis. In het Oud-Friesch, tevens in het Oud-Noorsch
luidt deze naam S i g u r d , dat is: sige, zege of overwinning, en urd,
vrede. Dat hier urd = vrede is, bevreemdt hem niet, die weet dat de
letter v oorspronkelijk anders niet is als eene u, namelijk de u die
een woord of lettergreep opent. De Ouden verwisselden zoo wel in
geschrifte als in uitspraak de u en de v. Men schreef wt, en sprak
uut; de w is eene dubbele v of dubbele u. Van vrede, urede, tot urde,
urd is de stap uiterst klein, en niet grooter dan van het
Nederlandsche avond (evond, e-u-ond, i-u-ond) tot het Friesche joun
of jond (i-u-ond). In dit oude woord urd = vrede sprak men de u
natuurlijk op de Oud-Friesche, de Hoogduitsche, de algemeen Oud-
Germaansche wijze uit, als de hedendaagsche Hollandsche oe in
het woord boer. Dus Sigoerd. De g is eene letter die de oude Friezen
veelvuldig als j uitspraken, en de hedendaagsche Friezen met de
hedendaagsche Engelschen doen dit nog in sommige woorden. Het
Nederlandsche woord gift of [207]gave luidt in het Oud-Friesch als
jeftha, in het hedendaagsche Friesch als jefte, jeft; b.v. in het woord
sketjeft. Het Nederlandsche woord garen luidt in het Friesch als jern
(jen), in het Engelsch als yarn; het Nederlandsche gister in ’t Friesch
als jister of juster, in ’t Engelsch als yester (day). Een kromme hoek
van het oude Jacobiner-kerkhof te Leeuwarden heet: „het kromme
Gat.” Maar de oude Leeuwarders spreken dezen naam nog heden
uit als: „’t kroeme jat.” De hedendaagsche Berlijners, al zijn ze zoo
min Friezen als Engelschen, zeggen ook Jott in plaats van Gott, en
jans in stede van gans. Zoo zeiden ook de oude Friezen Si-joerd
voor S i g u r d (Si-goerd). Bij vlugge uitspraak in het dagelijksche
leven werd Si-joerd al spoedig tot S j o e r d . Het onderscheid is
geheel onwezenlijk en ter nauwer nood hoorbaar.
Zoo is van het oorspronkelijke S i g u r d der oude Friezen en Noren
het hedendaagsche S j o e r d gekomen, bij de Friezen; en het
hedendaagsche S j û r d (ook als Sjoerd uitgesproken) bij de
bewoners van de Färör, een Oud-Noorsche volksstam. De letter r is
in dezen naam, volgens de gewone uitspraak der Friezen, zeer zwak
en nauwelijks hoorbaar, en slijt er gemakkelijk uit tot Sjoe’d, Sjoed,
gelijk men gemeenlijk spreekt. De Oost-Friezen en de Friezen die
verder oostwaarts op aan de monden van Wezer, Elve en Eider
wonen, hebben die r niet enkel in uitspraak, maar ook in geschrifte
volkomen verwaarloosd, maar de oorspronkelijke u (in Hoogduitsche
uitspraak) hebben ze behouden in dezen naam. Van daar dat bij hen
de volle oude naam S i g u r d heden ten dage, in uitspraak en
geschrifte, als S i u t voorkomt; in patronymicalen vorm, als
geslachtsnaam, S i u d t z en S i u t z . Het Oost-Friesche S i u t luidt
volkomen zoo als het Sjoe’d der Nederlandsche Friezen, en de
geslachtsnamen S i u d t z en S i u t z als S j o e r d s ten onzent.

Het schijnt dat de Friezen van de 16e en 17e eeuw, die, zoo zij
geestelijken, leeraars of anderszins geleerden waren, hunne namen
zoo graag vergriekschten en verlatijnschten, nog min of meer
duidelijk den ouden vollen vorm en de beteekenis van den naam
S j o e r d kenden. Althans zij, die van H e t t e maakten H e c t o r ,
van D o u w e D o m i n i c u s , van Ts j i b b e T i b e r i u s , van
S i b b e l t s j e S y b i l l a , enz., maakten S u f f r i d u s van S j o e r d .
In S u f f r i d u s , S u f f r i e d is nog eene [208]aanduiding van
S i e g f r i e d = S i g u r d te herkennen. Nog heden is deze in
schijnbaar Latijnschen vorm verdraaide naam S u f f r i d u s in
sommige Friesche maagschappen in gebruik.

De vrouwelijke vorm, eigenlijk de verkleinvorm of zoogenoemde

kleengedaante, van den naam S j o e r d is S j o e r d t s j e
(S j o e r d t j e , ook wel S j o e r d j e en S j o e r t j e in Nederlandsche
spelling). Daar zijn er genoeg Friezinnen die S j o e r d t s j e heeten,
maar weinigen die zoo genoemd worden. De Friezen zijn groote
liefhebbers om hunne namen te verkorten, te verdraaien en te
verknoeien. Zoo maken zij ook, in ’t dagelijksche leven, S j u t t e ,
S j u t s j e of beter S j u t t s j e , en zelfs S j u t e van den naam
S j o e r d t s j e . Zulke verdraaide namen zijn in der daad leelijk, en
het is waarlijk geen wonder dat menige schoone Friesche maagd
zich niet graag aldus hoort noemen, of dat zij op lateren leeftijd,
misschien als grootmoeder, er zich tegen verzet dat haar
kleindochterke of haar nichtje dien naam gegeven worde. Zoo gaan
er wel, door onverstand, schoone oude namen te loor, die men
zekerlijk niet zoude verwaarloosd hebben, zoo men den ouden,
vollen vorm en de dikwijls schoone, altijd eervolle en eerbare
beteekenis daar van gekend hadde. Dat dan de man die niet meer
S j o e r d , en de vrouw die niet meer S j o e r d t s j e of S j u t t e wil
heeten, noch ook deze namen aan hunne kinderen geven willen, niet
tot de opgesmukte namen van vreemden vervallen, of hunne namen
op belachelijke wijze verdraaien (van S j o e r d t s j e bij voorbeeld
S j o e r d i n a maken, of van R o m k j e R o m e l i a )! Dat men liever
de oude, schoone vormen herstelle, S j o e r d weêr tot S i g u r d
terug brenge, en S j o e r d t s j e als S i g u r d a in gebruik houde!
(Men lette er op de u op Oud-Friesche of Hoogduitsche wijze uit te
spreken, en den vollen klemtoon op de lettergreep gurd te laten
vallen.) Zoo blijft men Friesch, ook in zijne namen; zoo houdt men de
schoone, beteekenisvolle namen der edele voorouders in eere en in
gebruik, gelijk het waren Stand-Friezen past.

Dat de schoone naam S i g u r d bij de oude Friezen in eere en

veelvuldig in gebruik was, even als bij de Skandinavische volken,
blijkt ook hieruit, dat er nog heden zoo vele Friezen zijn die S j o e r d
heeten. Die algemeene verspreiding blijkt ook uit het groote aantal
geslachtsnamen, nog heden onder de Friezen [209]voorkomende, die
van den mansnaam S j o e r d afgeleid zijn. Dat zijn S j o e r d a en
ook S j o o r d a , S j o e r d i n g a , S j o e r d e m a , S j o e r d s m a ,
S j o e r d s , enz. Behalven de maagschapsnamen S i e u w e r t s z
en S i e w e r t s , S i u d t s en S i u t z bovengenoemd, nog
Siewertz, Sieverts, Sievertsz, Siewertsen,
S i e w e r t s z in noordelijk Holland, het aloude Friesland bewesten
Flie, en S i v e r t z , S i u r t z , S i u t s in de Friesche gouwen
beoosten Eems. De Hollanders die een looden pijp en een gouden
ketting ’n looie peip en ’n chouwe ketting noemen, laten veelvuldig,
gelijk deze voorbeelden reeds aantoonen, de d uit de woorden
slijten. Zoo doende is de geslachtsnaam S j o e r d s buiten Friesland
tot S j o e r s geworden. De letter r, die bij de Friezen zoo los in den
zadel zit, hebben de Hollanders in dezen patronymicalen
geslachtsnaam behouden, maar de d hebben zij verwaarloosd.

In oude oorkonden uit de jaren der 15e en het begin der 16e eeuw,
toen men de Friesche taal in Friesland ook nog in ambtelijke
geschriften bezigde, komt de naam der maagschap S j o e r d s m a
gewoonlijk als S i w r d i s m a en S i w r d e s m a , ook wel als
S i u w r d s m a voor. Bij deze spelling S i w r d , voor S j o e r d , komt
de samenhang met den Oud-Hollandschen vorm S i w e r t bijzonder
aan ’t licht. En tevens blijkt uit deze oude spelwijzen dat men
toenmaals de u, de v en de w als onze hedendaagsche oeklank in ’t
woord boer uitsprak.

Al de bovenstaande geslachtsnamen zijn patronymica of

vadersnamen. Zij zijn allen éérst gevoerd geworden door mannen
wier vaders den vóórnaam S j o e r d droegen; zij beteekenen allen,
zonder onderscheid, zoon van S j o e r d , van S i g u r d , van
Siegfried.

Uit al het bovenstaande blijkt hoe veel er van eenen enkelen

Frieschen naam kan gezegd worden. Zulk eene beschouwing van
alle hedendaagsche Friesche personennamen zoude ongetwijfeld
zeer veel belangrijke en merkwaardige zaken op het gebied van
taalkunde, geschiedenis en oudheidkunde aan het licht brengen.
Maar een schat van tijd en een schat van vlijt en toewijding is daar
toe noodig! Wie heeft zulke schatten steeds te zijner beschikking?
[210]

Reeds is in dit opstel met een enkel woord vermeld dat van ouds her
bij de Friezen het gebruik bijzonder sterk in zwang was om de
namen te verkorten, te verdraaien, te verknoeien. Aan den eenen
kant zekere gemakzucht van de tonge, waardoor men lange namen
schuwde, en namen van twee of drie volle lettergrepen reeds te lang
vond—en aan den anderen kant de neiging der menschen, vooral
van vrouwen in ’t algemeen en van moeders in het bijzonder, om aan
de voorwerpen hunner liefde kleine, mooie, zoete, lieve naamkes te
geven (poppenammen, zoo als de Friezen, kepnamen, zoo als de
West-Vlamingen, kosenamen, gelijk de Duitschers zeggen), dit zijn
de oorzaken van het ontstaan dezer misvormde namen. Trouwens
deze neiging is niet slechts den Friezen eigen, maar algemeen
onder de volken van Germaanschen bloede verspreid. De
Hollanders die K e e s maken van den volledigen vorm C o r n e l i s ,
K l a a s van N i c o l a a s en M i e van M a r i a , de Vlamingen en
Brabanders die S e f k e maken van J o s e f , C i e s van
F r a n c i s c u s en T r e e s k e van T h e r e s i a , de Engelschen die
B o b maken van R o b e r t , D i c k van R i c h a r d , J a m e s van
J a c o b en B e s s van E l i s a b e t h , de Duitschers eindelijk die
F r i t z maken van F r i e d r i c h , K u n t z van K o n r a d en M e t a
van M a r g a r e t h a , die allen handelen in deze zaak juist zoo als de
Friezen die G o s s e maken van G o d s s k a l k , K e i van G e r r i t
(G e r h a r d ), en G e r t j e of in de wandeling G j e t , van
G e r h a r d a of van G e r t r u d a . Gelijk ook S i b e van S i b r a n d
(S i g e b r a n d ), W o b b e van W o l b r e c h t , P i b b e van
S i b b e l t s j e , enz. Maar Hollanders, Vlamingen, Engelschen en
Duitschers gebruiken zulke verkorte en verdraaide namen in den
regel slechts in de dagelijksche spreektaal, en geenszins in
geschrifte. Zij weten in allen gevalle wat de volle, oorspronkelijke
vormen van die verbasterde namen zijn. De Friezen in tegendeel
hebben die poppenammen ook in hunne schrijftaal overgenomen. Bij
hen hebben die vleinaamkes geheel de plaats der volle, oude
vormen ingenomen, en de oorspronkelijke beteekenis dier namen is
bijna volkomen verloren gegaan, althans uit de gedachtenis en
herinnering des volks, ten eenen male verdwenen.

Dit is in der daad de hoofdoorzaak van de hedendaagsche

bijzonderheid en eigenaardigheid der Friesche namen. [211]

Zie hier een algemeen overzicht van de vleivormen en van de

verkleinvormen der namen, zoo als die bij het Friesche volk in
gebruik zijn.

De vleivormen zijn wel te onderscheiden van de samengetrokkene

en ingekorte naamsvormen, zoo als bij voorbeeld G e a r t en
F r e a r k of F r j e r k (in Nederlandsche spelling G e e r t en
F r e e r k ), dat samengetrokkene vormen zijn van G e r h a r d en
F r e d e r i k ; nevens H i l l e en B r a n d , dat ingekorte vormen zijn,
eigenlijk slechts halve namen, van den volledigen en
oorspronkelijken mansnaam H i l l e b r a n d (H i l d e b r a n d ).

De vleivormen zijn bij alle Germaansche volken in gebruik. Op de

vorige bladzijde zijn, als voorbeelden, eenige van die vleivormen
opgenoemd. Anderen zijn nog bij de Duitschers E d e voor
E d u a r d , H a n s voor J o h a n n e s , bij de Hollanders K o o s
voor J a c o b , A r i en A a i voor A d r i a a n , H e i n en H e n k
voor H e n d r i k , K e e t j e voor C o r n e l i a , bij de Engelschen
B i l l voor W i l l i a m , F a n n y voor F r a n c i s c a , enz. De
Engelsche naam J o h n is, even als de Nederlandsche naam J a n ,
de Fransche naam J e a n , de Spaansche naam J u a n , enz. op zijn
beurt eigenlijk ook maar een vleivorm van den volledigen
Bijbelschen naam J o h a n n e s .

Bij geen enkel Germaansch volk echter zijn de vleivormen der

namen zoo veelvuldig, zoo algemeen in gebruik als bij de Friezen.
Hier komt nog bij dat die vleivormen bij de Friezen volle burgerrecht
hebben verkregen als geijkte namen, zoo wel bij de doopvont, als in
de registers van den burgerlijken stand; terwijl bij de andere
Germaansche volken die vleivormen (immers bijna zonder
uitzondering) slechts in hunne oorspronkelijke kracht van bestaan in
gebruik zijn, slechts als vriendelijke namen in den huiselijken kring,
maar geenszins als geijkte namen in het openbare leven. De
vleivormen der namen zijn bij de Friezen zoo menigvuldig en zoo
algemeen in volle gebruik gekomen en genomen, dat zij de
oorspronkelijke, volledige vormen der namen, in menige gevallen,
schier volkomen uit het gebruik hebben verdrongen. In zulker
voegen, dat van verre weg de meesten dezer thans als geijkt
geldende vleivormen de oorspronkelijke, de werkelijk volledige
vormen niet meer bekend zijn; of althans, dat de samenhang is
verloren gegaan, dat men niet [212]meer weet van welken
oorspronkelijken, volledigen naam deze of gene hedendaags als
volledige naam geldende vleivorm eigenlijk is afgeleid. Van
sommigen weet men het wel; van W o b b e (om maar een enkele te
noemen) kan men aantoonen dat deze hedendaags als geijkt en
volledig geldende naam slechts een vleivorm is van den
oorspronkelijken, volledigen naam W o l b r e c h t ; van P i b e , dat
deze naam oorspronkelijk voluit S y b r e n is, even als To l l e komt
van F o l k e r t ; B e n n o en B i n n e van B e r n h a r d , E k k e van
E g b e r t , A l e en E l e van den eenen of anderen met den
naamsstam adel of edel samengestelden naam, bij voorbeeld
A d e l b r e c h t , E d e l m a r , enz. Maar bij andere vleinamen kan
men er hedendaags slechts met meer of minder goed geluk naar
raden, van welke oorspronkelijke en volledige namen ze zijn
afgeleid. Als voorbeelden uit deze overgroote afdeeling van Friesche
mansvóórnamen kunnen dienen: A b b e , A b e , A d d e , A g e ,
Agge, Ale, Alle, Ame, Amme, Ane, Atte, Bauwe,
B e n n e en B i n n e , B o a y e (in Nederlandsche spelling B o o y e
en B o y e ), B o e l e , B o k k e , B o n n e , B o t e , B o t t e ,
B o u w e , D e d d e , D j o e r e of D j u r r e , D o a y e (naar
Nederlandsche spelwijze D o o y e ), D o e d e , D o u w e , E a b e ,
E a d e , E a g e , E a l e , E a u w e (in Nederlandsche spelling
E e u w e ), E b e , E d e , E g g e , E k k e , E l e , E n n e en
Enno, Eppe, Fedde, Feye, Fekke, Foeke,
F o k k e , F o p p e , G a b b e , G a b e , G a l e , G o a y e (naar
Nederlandsche spelwijze G o o y e , G o y e ), G o f f e , G o s s e ,
G u r b e , H a e y e (in Nederlandsche spelling H a a y e of H a y o ),
Halbe, Harre, Hemme, Henne, Heppe, Here,
H e r r e , H e t t e , H i d d e , H o b b e , H o l l e , I b e of Y b e en
I e b e , I d e en I e d e , I m e en I e m e (deze drie laatste, op het
oog eenzelvige namen en naamsvormen, zijn volgens hunnen
oorsprong, en volgens de Friesche wijze van uitspraak, geheel
verschillende namen). I n n e , I p e of Y p e , I w e of I v o of J o u
(dit is, hoe vreemd het ook schijne, geheel één en de zelfde naam),
Jelle, Jisse, Jolle, Keimpe, Lieuwe, Lolle,
M e l l e , M e n n o en M i n n e , M o l l e , N a n n e , O b b e ,
Oege, Oene, Offe, Okke, Onne, Otte, Pabe,
P i b e , P o p p e , S j o l l e , Ta m m e , T i e d e , T i e t e ,
Ts j a l l e , Ts j a m m e , Ts j e b b e , Ts j i t t e (in Nederlandsche
spelling T j a l l e , T j a m m e , T j e b b e , [213]T j i t t e ), W a l l e en
W o b b e en nog vele anderen meer, van gelijksoortigen oorsprong
en vorm. Van alle deze op eene toonlooze e uitgaande namen valt
op te merken, dat zij eveneens, maar minder algemeen, voorkomen
met eene o op het einde: A b b o , D e d d o , H e r o en H e e r o ,
H i d d o , enz. zoo als trouwens bij een paar dezer namen in
bovenstaand lijstje reeds is aangegeven.
De bovenstaande vleivormen van oorspronkelijk volledige namen
hebben op hun beurt weêr het aanschijn gegeven aan
verkleinvormen, die dan ook weêr bij de Friezen als geijkte namen
gelden en dienst doen. En wijl deze verkleinnamen gevormd zijn
door het aanbrengen van verschillende verkleinende achtervoegsels
(namelijk se, te, le, tse, ke en tsje, dat is in Nederlandsche spelling
tje) achter deze vleivormen of vleinamen, zoo is hierdoor het reeds
bestaande overgroote aantal namen nog aanmerkelijk vermeerderd,
ja wel verdriedubbeld ten minste. Door verwantschappelijke en
vriendschappelijke genegenheid gedreven, hebben de Friezen van
alle eeuwen steeds gaarne zulke verkleinende aanhangsels achter
de volledige namen hunner bloedverwanten en vrienden gevoegd;
en zij doen dit nog heden ten dage, al kunnen die hedendaags
ontstane en in gebruik genomene verkleinvormen nu niet meer, gelijk
vroeger, als geijkte namen opkomen, noch ook geijkte geldigheid
erlangen.

De bovenvermelde verkleinende achtervoegsels se, te, le, tse, ke en

tsje (tje) zijn in de Friesche taal gegrondvest, zijn anders niet dan
Friesche taalvormen. Maar de drie eerstgenoemden zijn in de taal
volkomen verouderd, uit de spreek- en schrijftaal geheel verloren
gegaan; de vierde is in deze eeuw sterk verouderende, reeds
nagenoeg uitgestorven; terwijl de beide laatste achtervoegsels ook
nog in de levende taal, in haren hedendaagschen vorm bestaan.

Om de zaak den onfrieschen lezer duidelijker te maken stellen wij

hier dat de algemeen-Nederlandsche vleivormen in verkleinvorm
K e e s j e , K o o s j e , H e i n t j e voor jongetjes die eigenlijk in de
boeken van den burgerlijken stand C o r n e l i s , J a c o b (u s ) en
H e n d r i k heeten, en K a a t j e , K e e t j e , J a n s j e voor meisjes
die eigenlijk als C a t h a r i n a , C o r n e l i a , J o h a n n a te boek
staan, [214]ook de Duitsche namen F r i t z c h e n en L i e s c h e n , in
stede van F r i e d r i c h en E l i s a b e t h , geheel overeenkomen met
Friesche namen als B i n s e en Y n s e , J e l t e en H o a i t e
(H o o i t e ), A n d e l e en L i k e l e , A t s e en F e i t s e , A u k e en
D o e k e , B o n t s j e en E e l t s j e (B o n t j e en E e l t j e ), enz.
Onder dit voorbehoud, dat de bovengenoemde algemeen-
Nederlandsche vleivormen in verkleinvorm slechts gelden in ’t
dagelijksche leven en in den huiselijken kring, terwijl de soortgelijke
Friesche namen volkomen geijkte geldigheid hebben, ook in het
openbare leven.

Als voorbeelden van zulke Friesche mans- en vrouwen-vóórnamen,

die eigenlijk slechts vleinamen in verkleinvorm zijn, vermeld ik hier
de volgende namen:

1º. Op se eindigende, waar nevens ook de vorm op sen (slechts een

bijvorm) voorkomt: A e l s e en A e l s e n (in Nederlandsche spelling
A a l s e en A a l s e n ), A i s e of A i s o , A l s e , A m s e , B e n s e
met B i n s e , B i e n s e en B j i n s e , B o d s e , B o n s e n ,
Eadse, Ealse, Edse, Eelse, Eidse, Eise, Haeise
(volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze H a a i s e ), H e n s e , I n s e ,
Y n s e en Y n s e n , L i n s e , M e n s e , M e n s o en M i n s e ,
O e n s e , R i n s e , en vele dergelijken meer.

2º. Op te (oudtijds ook ta) eindigende: A i t e , A l t e , B e n t e en

B i n t e , B o a i t e (in Nederlandsche spelling B o o i t e en B o i t e ),
B o e t e , B o l t e , B o n t e , D o a i t e (volgens Nederlandsche
spelwijze D o o i t e ), E e n t e en E e n t o , E i t e , E n t e en I n t e ,
Feite, Heite, Hente, Ynte, Jelte, Joute, Monte,
H a e i t e (in Nederlandsche spelling H a a i t e ), H o a i t e (volgens
Nederlandsche spelwijze H o o i t e ), enz. enz.

3º. Op le eindigende: A m e l e , A n d e l e , B a r t e l e of B a r t l e ,
Bessele, Doekele, Eabele, Eagele, Ebbele,
Fokkele, Heabele, Hebbele, Hebele, Hessel,
I b e l e of Y b l e , I g l e , I k e l e , I m e l e , J a k k e l e , J i s l e ,
L y k e l e of L y k l e , N a m m e l e , O e b e l e , O k e l e , R e d l e ,
R i n g e l e , S i b b e l e of S i b b l e , Te a k e l e , W e s s e l ,
W i g g e l e , W o b b e l e , en nog anderen desgelijks.

4º. Op tse of tsen uitgaande: A e t s e (in Nederlandsche spelling

A a t s e ), A i t s e , A t s e , B e i n t s e , B e i t s e , B e t s e ,
B i e n t s e , B i n t s e en B i n t s e n , B j i n t s e n ; B o a i t s e en
B o a i t s e n [215](in Nederlandsche spelling B o o i t s e , B o i t s e
en B o o i t s e n ), D o a i t s e (volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze
D o o i t s e ), D o u w t s e n , E a l t s e , E a t s e , E e l t s e ,
E i t s e , F e i t s e , F e t s e , G a t s e , G e r t s e en G e r t s e n ,
G o a i t s e en G o a i t s e n (in Nederlandsche spelling G o o i t s e
en G o o i t s e n ), H a e i t s e (volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze
H a a i t s e ), H e n t s e , H e r t s e en H e r t s e n , H o a i t s e (in
Nederlandsche spelling H o o i t s e ), H o a t s e (volgens
Nederlandsche spelwijze H o t s e ), Y n t s e en Y n t s e n , Y t s e n ,
J e l t s e en J e l t s e n , J e t s e , J i t s e , L ú t s e n (in
Nederlandsche spelling L u i t s e n ), M i n t s e , O e n t s e ,
R e i t s e , S y t s e (eigenlijk S y t t s e , S y t - t s e , dat is: de
verkleinvorm tse achter den vleivorm S i t e , S y t ), S w e i t s e ,
Ts j i t s e (volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze T j i t s e ), W a t s e ,
W y t s e , (W y t - t s e ; zie bij S y t s e , en ook Ts j i t s e , hierboven);
en vele anderen van deze soort.

5º. Op ke (of op eene enkele k) uitgaande: A m k e , A u k e ,

B a u k e , B i n k e , B o a i k e (in Nederlandsche spelling B o o i k e
en B o i k e ), B o l k e , B o u k e , D o a i k e (volgens Nederlandsche
spelwijze D o o i k e ), D o e k e of D u c o , E a l k e , E b k e ,
E e l k e of E e l c o , E p k e , F e i k e , F o p k e , G a l k e ,
G e r k e of G e r k , H a e i k e (in Nederlandsche spelling
H a a i k e ), H a r k e of H a r k , H e e r k e , H e m k e , H e p k e ,
H e r k e , J e l k e , J i s k , J o u k e , L o l k e , M e n k e of
Menco, Oepke, Popke, Rinke, Rouke, Sjouke,
S o l k e of S o l c o , Ts j a l k e (volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze
T j a l k e ), Ts j e p k e (in Nederlandsche spelling T j e p k e ), en nog
een groot aantal soortgelijken.

6º. Op tsje (in Nederlandsche spelling tje) uitgaande: A t s j e

(volgens Nederlandsche spelwijze A t j e ), B i n t s j e , B o a i t s j e ,
Boeltsje, Bontsje, Ealtsje, Eeltsje, Galtsje,
G o a i t s j e , H a e i t s j e , J e l t s j e , M i n t s j e , O e n t s j e (in
Nederlandsche spelling B i n t j e , B o o i t j e , G o o i t j e ,
H a a i t j e , O e n t j e , enz.), en vele dergelijken meer.

Ook bij al deze namen in verkleinvorm wordt de toonlooze e op het

einde eveneens wel door eene volklinkende o vervangen, zoo als in
sommige gevallen reeds in bovenstaande lijstjes aangetoond is. De
namen worden hierdoor in der daad klankrijker en schooner, en
verliezen niets van hunne zuiverheid; integendeel, zij winnen er bij.
Maar de namen op tsje eindigende, op den jongsten verkleinvorm,
die voortspruit uit eenen nog hedendaags [216]geldenden taalvorm,
maken hierop, althans in Friesland tusschen Flie en Lauwers, eene
uitzondering. Die krijgen nooit eene o achter zich, in de plaats van
de toonlooze e. Dit zoude dan ook al te sterk indruischen tegen het
fijn ontwikkelde taalverstand en taalgevoel, den echten Friezen in
den regel eigen. Maar Groningerlanders en Oost-Friezen vervormen
ook wel die toonlooze e van hunne verkleinnamen op tje in eene o.
Namen als A l t j o , E l t j o , E n t j o , R e l t j o , R e n t j o zijn bij
hen niet zeldzaam.

De vleinamen, die aan alle deze verkleinnamen ten grondslag liggen

(bij voorbeeld A l e bij A e l s e [A a l s e ], A y e bij A i t e , A g e bij
A g e l e , B i n n e bij B i n t s e , A b b e bij A b b e k e , A t t e bij
A t s j e ) zijn gemakkelijk te herkennen, en staven dan mijn
bovenvermeld inzicht aangaande de vorming en den oorsprong