an action to recover land or other real property and to collect damages. Originally, in the English common law, only tenants could use this action to recover possession of land from which they had been unlawfully ousted. Because of the simplicity and swiftness of the ejectment procedure, landowners began to use this action to recover land. To do so, the landowner, on behalf of a fictitious tenant (John Doe), sued a fictitious defendant (Richard Roe) for ousting the fictitious tenant. The court titled such cases John Doe ex dem. “Landowner” v. Richard Roe. When the defendant appeared in court, the clerk sometimes replaced “Richard Roe” with the defendant’s real name. In 1839, the Illinois legislature abolished the need for the fictitious names. The losing party in an ejectment case was entitled by law to one new trial simply by paying the court costs. See also Forcible Entry and Detainer.