Strongest Chess Tournament of All Time

All on a sudden morning today, I started thinking the following things. I will try to figure those out and let you all know. But if one of my readers can share some information on this, I would really appreciate.

1. The strongest tournament of 18th century.
2. The strongest tournament of 19th century.
3. The strongest tournament of 20th century before ELO rating systems started.
4. The strongest tournament of 20th century after ELO rating systems started. Please mention if there was any Category 22 tournament ever. Also may be we can get a list of Category 21 tournaments ever played.

I found last year Mexico Chess world championship's average rating was 2751.75 where Anand won and became world champion. But 1996 Las Palmas (that Kasparov won) was the highest with 2757 average rating according to this discussion - http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/2008/02/strongest-tournament-of-year.html . This thread suggests that after that this week's Linares-Moreila 2008 will be second highest rated tournament with average rating of 2756.

For those who want to know a subjective evaluation of who was the greatest chess player of all time and which one performance is the best of all the tournament performances by any player, you might consider the following Chessbase article series.

• http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2345
• http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2354
• http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2372
• http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2409

Update: Anand won Moreila Linares 2008, the second strongest rated tournament of all time with a minimum margin over Carlsen. Hurrah! This will give him a confident world championship match ahead against Kramnik. It has been one of the most fighting tournaments of recent times with a very high number of decisive games.

http://www.chessninja.com/dailydirt/2008/03/anand_wins_linares_2008.htm
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=4493