SHADUR, Senior District Judge.
We deal here with a proposed Amended Complaint that seeks to bring individual defendants into a federal civil rights action— persons who were not named as defendants before the expiration of the normal two-year statute of limitations after they had engaged in the conduct that allegedly violated plaintiffs constitutional rights. Because the district court did not properly take into account the provisions of Fed.R.Civ.P. (“Rule”) 15(e) in determining whether the Amended Complaint should relate back to the date of the original Complaint as to those newly-named defendants, the record was not fully enough developed to allow that question to be answered here. Accordingly we remand the case to the district court for that purpose.
Legal Framework
In a sharp departure from the old “sporting theory” of litigation, “[t]he Federal Rules reject the approach that pleading is a game of skill in which one misstep by counsel may be decisive to the outcome and affect the principle that the purpose of pleading is to facilitate a proper decision on the merits” (Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 48, 78 S.Ct. 99, 103, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1958)). But competing considerations enter the fray when a lawyer’s mistake (either of fact or of law) can' prejudice the other side’s defense. It may then become difficult or impossible to avoid a result dictated by the skill of counsel rather than by the merits of the client’s case.
That tension of competing values is exemplified in Rule 15(c), which now reads in relevant part:
An amendment of a pleading relates back to the date of the original pleading when
(1) relation back is permitted by the law that provides the statute of limitations applicable to the action, or
(2) the claim or defense asserted in the amended pleading arose out of the conduct, transaction, or occurrence set forth or attempted to be set forth in the original pleading, or
(3) the amendment changes the party or the naming of the party against whom a claim is asserted if the foregoing provision (2) is satisfied and, within the period provided by Rule 4(j) for service of the summons and complaint, the party to be brought in by amendment (A) has received such notice of the institution of the action that the party will not be prejudiced in maintaining a defense on the merits, and (B) knew or should have known that, but for a mistake concerning the identity of the proper party, the action would have been brought against the party.1
[883]*883We have long left no doubt of the broad scope to be given Rule 15(e). As we said in Staren v. American National Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago, 529 F.2d 1257, 1263 (7th Cir.1976):
It is well settled that the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are to be liberally construed to effectuate the general purpose of seeing that cases are tried on the merits and to dispense with technical procedural problems. To this end, amendments pursuant to Rule 15(c) should be freely allowed.
And as we said in Hill v. Shelander, 924 F.2d 1370, 1375 (7th Cir.1991):
Rule 15(c) ... recognizes that legitimate legal claims may not be squelched when a party mistakenly identifies a party to be sued within the meaning of Rule 15(c).
This case is on appeal from a grant of summary judgment in defendants’ favor on the ground that the claims of plaintiff Carl Woods (“Woods”) against them were found to be time-barred — as is plainly the case unless Woods can successfully invoke Rule 15(c). Woods’ original Complaint, alleging violations of 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983, 1985 and 1986, was filed not against any individuals but rather against defendants that could only be construed as Indiana University and its police department. It took considerable time before Woods’ counsel finally reshaped the Complaint to target only the ultimate individual defendants in their individual capacities. At that point the district court held that the Amended Complaint did not relate back and that the action against the individuals was outlawed by limitations.
On appeal Woods argues principally that the district court misapplied Rule 15(c) in refusing to relate the Amended Complaint back to the date of the original Complaint. We find that the impact of Rule 15(c) was not properly explored below and, for the reasons that follow, we therefore conclude that this action must be remanded to the district court for further proceedings.
Factual Background
Carl Woods joined the Indiana University Police Department as a police officer in March 1973. Over twelve years later (on July 17, 1985) other officers allegedly witnessed Woods wearing hospital uniforms (“scrubs”). Based on that information Lieutenant Frank Ingram signed an affidavit that served as support for a search warrant of Woods’ home. During the search officers uncovered and seized such items as scrubs, marijuana and drug paraphernalia. On July 22, 1985 Indiana University suspended Woods, and then on July 26, 1985 it fired him.
On August 19, 1985 the Marion County prosecutor brought criminal charges against Woods. Those charges led to Woods’ conviction on a Class A misdemeanor: possession of drug paraphernalia. However, because “no reasonable well-trained officer could have held an objectively reasonable belief the search was constitutional” (Woods v. State, 514 N.E.2d 1277, 1283 (Ind.App.1987)), the Indiana Court of Appeals threw out the conviction.
On July 15,1987 Woods filed a federal civil rights action against “Indiana-University-Purdue University at Indianapolis and Indiana University Police Department of Indianapolis.” That original Complaint and the accompanying summons were served on the University’s Police Chief John Mulvey two days later. Because Indiana University enjoys the same Eleventh Amendment immunity as the State of Indiana itself (Shannon v. Bepko, 684 F.Supp. 1465 (S.D.Ind.1988)), on November 10,1988 the district court granted defendants’ motion for judgment on the pleadings. That dismissal was specifically stated to be without prejudice.
On December 12, 1988 Woods filed an Amended Complaint, naming as defendants George W. Combs, John Mulvey, Scott Even-beck, Clifford Robinson, Maurice Smith, Clyde Rogers, Douglas Cox, Francis Ingram and Larry Propst, all of whom were employees of the University or its police department during 1985. On March 2, 1990 the district court, citing Brunken v. Lance, 807 F.2d [884]*8841325, 1329 (7th Cir.1986), dismissed Woods’ claims against those defendants in their official capacities.
Finally, in an opinion dated May 6, 1992 the district court granted summary judgment dismissing Woods’ claims against those defendants in their individual capacities as time-barred. That' decision- — which resulted from the district court’s reading of Rule 15(c) — engendered this appeal, over which we have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review the district court’s grant of summary judgment de novo (Wilcox v. Niagara of Wisconsin Paper Corp., 965 F.2d 355, 357 n. 1 (7th Cir.1992)).
Rule 15(c)
Once an action has been timely filed, fairness militates against allowing a limitations defense to an opposing party who knows of the action within the required time frame — even though that party is named as a defendant only later, in an amendment that arises out of the same conduct, transaction or occurrence addressed in the original pleading (see generally 6A Charles Wright, Arthur Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure: Civil 2d § 1496, at 64; id. § 1498, at 107 (2d ed. 1990 & 1992 pocket part)). That concept, which has its roots in the equitable notion that dispositive decisions should be based on the merits rather than technicalities, has been embodied since 1937 in Rule 15(c) (see Justice Stevens’ dissent from the now-overturned decision in Schiavone v. Fortune, 477 U.S. 21, 38, 106 S.Ct. 2379, 2388, 91 L.Ed.2d 18 (1986) (“The principal purpose of rule 15(c) is to enable a plaintiff to correct a pleading error after the statute of limitations has run if the correction will not prejudice his adversary in any way.”). As Justice Black commented in 1954 on an Order Adopting Revised Rules of the Supreme Court of the United States, 346 U.S. 945, 946:
The principal function of procedural rules should be to serve as useful guides to help, not hinder, persons who have a legal right to bring their problems before the courts.
Consistent with its history and purpose, Rule 15(c) has uniformly been applied to relate back amendments that cure defective statements of jurisdiction or venue or that change the theory on which plaintiff seeks recovery.2 Many courts (though not all3) have similarly employed Rule 15(c) to allow the relation back of amendments changing or adding parties so long as no prejudice will ensue (see, e.g., Travelers Indent. Co. v. United States ex rel. Constr. Specialties Co., 382 F.2d 103, 106 (10th Cir.1967)).
But the path has not always been smooth. Most notoriously, Schiavone reached a result incongruous with Rule 15(e)’s equitable history and purpose.4 Some background explanation is needed to demonstrate the anomaly posed by that decision.
If a plaintiff files a timely complaint, Rule 4(j) requires that each defendant be served with process within 120 days (unless that period is extended for good cause), on pain of dismissal if service has not been accomplished. Even though Rule 4(j) dictates a dismissal without prejudice, the dismissal effectively operates with prejudice if the statute of limitations has run in the meantime. However, a party properly named in the complaint and then timely served cannot escape on limitations grounds even if he or she [885]*885or it has not learned of the lawsuit until after the running of the limitations period.
But if the plaintiff had named an improper defendant and had then cured that flaw only-after the limitations period had run, in the absence of a relation-back principle the newly named defendant would be dismissed even though served with process before the Rule 4(j) 120-day period (measured from the filing of the original complaint) had elapsed. Thus a defendant served (say) just 10 days after expiration of the period of limitations would escape suit if the original complaint had contained a misnomer and if that defendant had then been correctly identified just one day after the statute had run, while a defendant who remained unaware of the case for up to 120 days (or more if that period were extended) after the running of the statute of limitations could not plead the statutory bar if the complaint had originally identified that defendant (see our discussion of that anomaly in Diaz v. Shallbetter, 984 F.2d 850 (7th Cir.1993)). Though some pr e-Schiavone courts had rejected that result as out of synch with the purpose of Rule 15(e) (see e.g., Ingram v. Kumar, 585 F.2d 566, 571 (2d Cir.1978)), Schiavone read the rule as literally commanding that outcome.
Schiavone aroused pointed criticism not only from the very outset (see Justice Stevens’ dissent, speaking for the Chief Justice and Justice White as well, especially 477 U.S. at 38 — 40, 106 S.Ct. at 2388-90) but thereafter. That criticism culminated in the 1991 amendment to Rule 15(c). That amendment, which was adopted specifically “to change the result in Schiavone ... with respect to the problem of a misnamed defendant” (Advisory Committee’s Note to Rule 15(c)(3)), provides that if a plaintiff amends the complaint to correct the mistake by naming the proper party and if that party has received appropriate notice of the lawsuit within the time period prescribed by Rule 4(j) (rather than before the statute of limitations would otherwise have run),5 the amendment relates back to the time that the original complaint was filed.
Because the record before us is unclear as to just when the individual defendants other than Chief Mulvey were first notified of Woods’ lawsuit, we cannot tell whether Woods does or does not need to invoke the current version of Rule 15(e) to stay in court against those defendants. Thus it appears that to provide guidance to the district court on the required remand of the case, we must first consider whether the new or old version of Rule 15(c) applies to Woods’ Amended Complaint.
We have not had occasion to consider whether and under what circumstances the 1991 revision to Rule 15(c) comes into play by a district court in actions that were pending before it on the effective date of that revision. To do so we are not called upon to decide which of the mixed signals that were explored at length in Kaiser Aluminum & Chem. Corp. v. Bonjorno, 494 U.S. 827, 110 S.Ct. 1570, 108 L.Ed.2d 842 (1990) ought to be followed where a new rule comes into effect only while the case is on appeal, after the district court has already disposed of the case: either the line of authority exemplified by Bradley v. Richmond Sch. Bd., 416 U.S. 696, 94 S.Ct. 2006, 40 L.Ed.2d 476 (1974) or that exemplified by Bowen v. Georgetown Univ. Hosp., 488 U.S. 204, 109 S.Ct. 468, 102 L.Ed.2d 493 (1988) (of which a bit more later).
In this instance the authority that promulgated the package of Rules amendments that included the Rule 15(c) revision — the Supreme Court itself — has been explicit in its April 30, 1991 order adopting those amendments and transmitting them to Congress under 28 U.S.C. § 2072 (134 F.R.D. 525 (emphasis added)):
That the foregoing additions to and changes in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the Supplemental Rules for Certain Admiralty and Maritime Claims, and the Civil Forms shall take effect on December 1, 1991, and shall govern all proceedings in civil actions thereafter commenced and, insofar as just and practicable, all proceedings in civil actions then pending.
[886]*886There is no question that on December 1, 1991 this was a “civil action[ ] then pending”: It was not until five months later (on May 6, 1992) that the district court here dismissed both Woods’ Amended Complaint and the action because the new pleading had brought the present defendants into the case after the statute of limitations had run. Hence the case stands in sharp contrast to the one that we dealt with in Diaz, where the district court’s dismissal had preceded December 1, 1991 and the question was therefore whether our court should revive the action in a decision rendered after that effective date. That situation presented in bold profile the Bradley-Bowen conflict as to what law an appellate court should apply in the first instance, and Diaz chose the path of nonrevival as a matter of law.6 That represents the law of our circuit, and if we were presented with a like set of facts here we would be called upon to affirm the district court’s order of dismissal.
But in the wholly different situation before us — one that unquestionably involves a “civil action[] then pending” before the district court on December 1, 1991 — we honor the Supreme Court’s express directive, and we therefore hold that the district court should have determined whether it was “just and practicable” to determine the parties’ rights and obligations under the new version of Rule 15(c). And as the Rule is written, that determination really merges with the twofold inquiry mandated by Rule 15(c)(3): whether within the Rule 4(j) period the newly-named defendant:
(A) has received such notice of the institution of the action that the party will not be prejudiced in maintaining a defense on the merits, and (B) knew or should have known that, but for a mistake concerning the identity of the proper party, the action would have been brought against the party.7
Given the district court’s awareness of the 1991 amendment to Rule 15(c) (that was the version it quoted in its opinion), it is surprising that its analysis set forth the now-overruled Schiavone analysis in these terms:
For the present case, the rule provides that if additional defendants receive notice within the applicable statute of limitations, and would not be prejudiced in defending, the amended complaint adding defendants would relate back.8
Consequently the district court failed to consider whether the result as to any defendant would be different under the old and the new versions of Rule 15(c), or whether application of the new version of the rule would cause injustice as to any defendant and should not be applied for that reason. Those determinations are for resolution by the district court- in the first instance and should be made on remand.
Whether or not it proves necessary to apply the new version of Rule 15(c) to provide another 120 days for notification to any defendant, there are a number of other issues that the district court must resolve. To be sure, there is no question that the amended complaint arose out of the same facts as did the original complaint, as both the old and new versions of Rule 15(c) require. Nor, properly understood, is there an issue as to whether plaintiff made a “mistake” as to the identity of the proper party for this Section 1983 action, or as to whether Woods would [887]*887have sued the proper party but for that mistake (ef., e.g., our opinion in Hill, 924 F.2d at 1374-78, and the explicit statements in Hampton v. Hanrahan, 522 F.Supp. 140, 144 (N.D.Ill.1981) and cases cited there (“mistake” as used in Rule 15(c) applies to mistakes of law as well as fact)).9
Both versions of Rule 15(c) also require a court to determine what an omitted defendant having notice of a lawsuit “should have known” in consequence of the plaintiffs “mistake” (that is, in light of the plaintiffs failure to understand that the originally omitted defendant was a party that should have been sued in the first place). Where as in this ease (and as was true in Hill) the plaintiffs mistake was one of law, the proper analysis of that factor poses a question much like that of determining qualified immunity in Section 1983 actions: whether the legal proposition at issue was “clearly established.” As taught by Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 815-19, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2736-39, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982), Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 641, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 3039, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987) and their numerous progeny, for that purpose the inquiry is objective and not sub jective — in essence, all public officials are presumed to know clearly established law, whether or not they have in fact ever cracked a law book. Here there can be no doubt that every state’s sovereign immunity from, and all state employees’ personal exposure to, Section 1983 liability for constitutional torts was clearly established when this lawsuit was filed (even though that realization came only belatedly to Woods’ lawyer). And thus the objective question — what the omitted defendants “should have known” about whether they would have been named to begin with but for the mistake by Woods’ lawyer, rather than the purely subjective question of what any individual defendant actually knew in that respect — permits of only one answer.
It is somewhat difficult to understand the path traveled by the concurrence on these issues of mistake and of what defendants should have known on that score. What it comes down to purely and simply is (1) that it was the legal blunder of Woods’ counsel— his “mistake” — that caused his continued (and fruitless) pursuit of state agencies rather than individual state actors as defendants in the case and (2) that the law ascribes to everyone, including the later-named individuals, the knowledge of the law that prescribes the potential Section 1983 liability of those individuals and not of the State itself — so that if it had not been for counsel’s legal blunder, those individuals would have been the direct targets of the Complaint from the outset.
Hence the issues that the district court must address on remand do not include the tautological existence of a presumptively known mistake of the type specified in Rule 15(c)(3)(B). This does not at all read the requirement out of Rule 15(c) — it is rather that the requirement is so readily satisfied in the situation presented here. But there are other questions that the district court will have to address on remand — questions that do not conflate with the unquestionable presence of a presumptively known mistake by Woods in not bringing the individuals into the case earlier. After all, the Rule’s language expressly calls for a double inquiry: It separates as subparagraphs (A) and (B) the issues of nonprejudicial “notice” and of “mistake.” As for the issue of “mistake,” what has already been said here deals with that component of Rule 15(c). We believe that it unnecessarily muddies the waters to treat that question as inextricably intertwined with the questions of notice and prejudice under Rule 15(c). Certainly Rule 15(e)’s language does not call for such treatment in either the earlier or later incarnation of the Rule, even though the concurrence urges otherwise.
Before we turn to what are indeed entwined issues — those of notice and prejudice — one other point should be clarified. Because the district court mistakenly thought that the original complaint was filed on August 13, 1987 (instead the case was actually filed on July 15, 1987), it apparently perceived the lawsuit as having been filed more than two years after the operative [888]*888events to begin with. But because the individual defendants must be looked at separately as to when each allegedly violated Woods’ constitutional rights, it will be necessary to determine when the limitations time clock began to run as to each of them.
Now for the issues that Rule 15(c) does link together: the questions of “notice” and whether the quality of that notice was such as to negate “prejudice” to a newly-added defendant. Both the old and the new versions of Rule 15(c) say that amendments relate back only if the defendant received “such notice of the institution of the action that the [defendant] will not be prejudiced in maintaining his defense on the merits.”10
In that respect the district court’s analysis was incomplete. As to Chief Mulvey, the district court determined that service of the original complaint on him could not serve as proper notice. As to the other defendants, the district court concluded that Woods “notified the individual defendants on December 12, 1988, when [he] filed his First Amended Complaint.”
Both of those conclusions misperceive the thrust and the impact of Rule 15(c). “Notice,” as that term is employed in the rule, serves as the means for evaluating prejudice. As stated in Wright, Miller & Kane § 1497, at 91-93 (footnotes omitted):
It has been suggested that the requisite notice must be given by the content of the original pleadings. Other cases have taken a broader view and have held that it is sufficient if the opposing party was made aware of the matters to be raised by the amendment from-sources other than the pleadings, a position that seems sound since it is. unwise-to place undue emphasis on the particular way in which notice is received. An approach that better reflects the liberal policy of Rule 15(c) is to determine whether the adverse party, viewed as a reasonably prudent person, ought to have been able to anticipate or should have expected that the character of the originally pleaded claim might be altered or that other aspects of the conduct, transaction, or occurrence set forth in the original pleading might be called into question.
And both Hill, 924 F.2d at 1376-78111 and its reading of Kirk v. Cronvich, 629 F.2d 404 (5th Cir.1980) 12 could not have been more explicit that the statute of limitations does not insulate from suit an individual who did not initially receive service (or other notice) in the correct capacity, so long as no prejudice resulted.
For purposes of the analysis it must be kept in mind that the Rule’s language also expressly contemplates the prospect of the retrospective application of an amended complaint to a defendant who was not named originally but who was added only later, when plaintiff or plaintiffs attorney realized that the defendant should have been named at the outset. And that of course includes (indeed, it would far more commonly involve) a defendant who was not named at all to begin with (as was true in Kirk in the Section 1983 context, and as is true in virtually every lawsuit out of the Section 1983 context), rather than a defendant who was named at the beginning but was originally sued in the wrong capacity.
On the first aspect of the linked issues of “notice” and “prejudice,” Woods has claimed before us that all of the defendants conceded below that they did receive timely notice of the action. Whether or not that is so (a [889]*889matter on which we are left with substantial doubt13), it seems plain that the district court did not analyze just when each individual defendant had notice of the suit or whether the nature of that notice was such as to each defendant that he would now be prejudiced in defending on the merits. Those determinations are obviously crucial under Rule 15(e) and, contrary to the intimation of the district court’s opinion, cannot be made solely on the basis of when a party is named in a complaint. Circuit case law makes clear, for example, that relation back is proper “if a sufficient identity of interest exists between the new defendant and the original one so that relation back would not be prejudicial” (Norton, 627 F.2d at 21). And such an identity of interest is simply exemplary of the congeries of factors that may enter into a determination of the existence or the absence of prejudice.
As to defendant Ingram, the district court’s holding plainly makes sense. Ingram’s affidavit says that he left the police department before the original Complaint was filed and that he never received any notice of the suit before December 12, 1988. Woods has not identified any contrary evidence sufficient to defeat summary judgment. But as to each of the other defendants, neither the record on appeal nor the-district court’s opinion suffices to support the district court’s holding. Instead the district court must determine both the accuracy of Woods’ assertion as to when those defendants knew of his suit14 and the factors that bear on the issue of prejudice.
In summary, on remand the district court should determine as to each defendant the date on which the limitations period began to run, the time and nature of the notice that he received and whether he would be prejudiced by relating back the Amended Complaint. Only after that is done can it be determined whether the requirements of Rule 15(c) have been met as to each defendant so as to enable Woods’ claims to be dealt with on the merits.
Other Issues
Like most appellants, Woods has advanced some fallback arguments as well as a few other bones to pick with the district court’s rulings. None is persuasive, nor do they deserve much expenditure of time. We address the only two that merit discussion.
1. Official Capacity
Woods argues that even if his Amended Complaint does not relate back, both (1) his suit against the original defendants and (2) his claims against defendants in their official capacities were and are proper. As authority he directs this court to such eases as Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714 (1908) and Hafer v. Melo, — U.S. -, 112 S.Ct. 358, 116 [890]*890L.Ed.2d 301 (1991). That argument demonstrates a serious misunderstanding of Eleventh Amendment jurisprudence. Only a passing glance at those cases and at Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U.S. 58, 109 S.Ct. 2304, 105 L.Ed.2d 45 (1989) — and at our decision in Brunken, 807 F.2d at 1328-29 as well — is needed to see that Woods’ Complaint as originally filed failed to state a claim on which relief could have been granted.
2. Statutes of Limitations
Except for 42 U.S.C. § 1986, which provides a one year limitations period, none of the civil rights statutes on which Woods rests his claims specifies a statute of limitations. Woods argues that the district court should have borrowed Indiana’s five year limitations period governing actions against public officers. But we rejected that argument over six years ago as to Indiana-based Section 1983 actions (Loy v. Clamme, 804 F.2d 405 (7th Cir.1986) (per curiam)), and we have reconfirmed that ruling almost two years ago as to Section 1981 actions as well (Coopwood v. Lake County Community Dev. Dept., 932 F.2d 677, 678-81 (7th Cir.1991)). We shall not revisit the issue now.
Conclusion
We conclude that the district court erred by refusing to relate back Woods’ Amended Complaint without adequately addressing the interplay of Rule 15(c)’s requirements of notice and prejudice. That conclusion does not hobble defendants. If any of them received such insufficient or untimely notice that he would be prejudiced by relation back of the Amended Complaint, the Amended Complaint will be barred as to that defendant by the applicable limitations period. But conversely, if any defendant did receive a timely notice of such a nature that he would not be prejudiced by relation back of the Amended Complaint, he cannot rely on Woods’ technical errors to avoid the consequences of his actions and must respond on the merits. We Revekse the district court’s order of dismissal, and this action is Remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.