Nimzo-Larsen attack during 19th century. General trends.

I've found 16 games: NLA during 19th century. I indicate main lines and deviations. Engine evaluations are taken from the ChessOK database.

Modern Variation:

• van't Kruijs - de Heer (1851, 1-0): 1. b3 (-0.07) e5 2. Bb2 Nc6 3. g3 double fianchetto (-0.26)
• Suhle - Anderssen (1859, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 Nc6 3. e3 Nf6 4. Bb5 Bd6 5. d3 Suhle variation (-0.44)
• Czarnowski - d'André (1867, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. Ba3 Barium attack (-0.56)
  
• Magnus - Schalopp (1868, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. g3 double fianchetto (-0.26)
• Owen - Blackburne (1870, 1-0): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 f6 Blackburne defense (+0.37)
• Owen - Green (1870, 1-0): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 Nc6 3. e3 Nf6 4. Bb5 d6 5. Bxc6 white LSB exchange (-0.15)
• Owen - de Vere (1872, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 Nc6 3. e3 f5 de Vere counterattack (+0.26)
  
• Skipworth - Burn (1875, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 f6 Blackburne defense
• Paulsen - von Bardeleben (1892, 1/2-1/2): 1. b3 e5 2. c4 King's English (-0.11)
• Delmar - Helms (1894, 0-1): 1. b3 e5 2. Bb2 d5 Helms gambit (+0.15)
  
  

Classical Variation:

• Smith - Fischer (1873, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 (+0.00) 2. Bb2 (-0.04) c5 (+0.04) 3. d4 QPG (-0.15)
• Paulsen -Tarrasch (1892, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 2. d4 QPG (-0.15)
• Olly - Delmar (1893, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 2. Bb2 d4 Delmar counterattack (+0.37)
• Olly - Lee (1893, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 2. Bb2 Nf6 3. e3 e6 (+0.04) 4. Nf3 Be7 (+0.07) 5. c4 O-O 6. Nc3 Olly-Lee main line (+0.07)
  
• Olly - Pillsburry (1893, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 2. Bb2 e6 Pillsburry defense (+0.04)
  
• Maroszy - Charousek (1896, 0-1): 1. b3 d5 2. f4 Dutch variation (-0.11)

 I'll post statistical evaluations here.

It's surprising that nobody thought to play the Réti variation 1. b3 d5 2. Nf3.

P.S. Actually, I have found 2 Albin's games arising as transpositions from the Réti opening. I'll add them to the first post.

Oh, I've discovered my own thread LoL (I create so many topics ) that seems a bit useful for those who like NLA. 

Bump, I'll continue to extend this little historical analysis to the beginning of 20th century. 

    1.b3 d5 2.d4 is not Nimzowitch Larsen , it's actually a no name opening(you can call it irregular queen's pawn opening). 

    Also 1.b3 d5 2.f4 is Bird and the double fianchetto is Benko(1.g3). In Nimzo Larsen White doesn't want to do a double fianchetto while in Benko the early double fianchetto is one of the ways to avoid transposition to Reti and often leads to hippo. 

All right, I can agree with your remarks. 

Are you trying to make me feel bad?

LoL Why ?!?  U made reasonable remarks. I also put the name QPG = Queen's Pawn Game for 2. d4 games as U can see in the first post. 

Please don't agree with me. Even when you do , don't say it!

Love it, they were first hyper-modern masters not Reti, Nimzovitch and the rest; 19th century masters are the best and creative and greatest innovators, and the rest are copy-cat "meow".

And, as I tried to show in colors, they played something close to the modern main lines. 

These masters certainly understood chess a lot. I found a game of a guy I never heard before(Max Judd) who played Cozio defense with a hypermodern way that became popular more than 100 years later(about 2 decades ago) and revived Cozio. Quite amazing for an era with no databases and almost no books.