Deep Sky collections and catalogs similar to Messier’s

This list is also available in a slightly more

systematically organized format

Besides the more comprehensive professional catalogs which came into use

after Messier’s list, several similar

lists have been compiled, first because Messier had not captured all

showpieces even in the Northern skies (he simply cataloged what came into

his field of view, more or less by chance, and what he could measure),

and he never went to the Southern hemisphere (not even to latitudes south

of Paris, which is at about 49 degrees Northern latitude).

This lack of completeness, connected with a certain arbitrariness, gave rise

to several people to fill in with similar object collections, although these

are not of the same importance in

history.

Some of these catalogs are available online and listed below:

Several smaller catalogs of historical importance are given in our
History of Deep Sky Discovery page;

this includes Halley‘s 6-object catalog.

We also hold some of the other

historical catalogs;

some of them may still be interesting for amateur workthrough.
Lacaille‘s
“Catalogue of Nebulae of the Southern Sky”

may be of special interest due to its historical relevance

(also available as ascii file).

We also have a copy of the

original Lacaille catalog

(as reprinted in an appendix of Messier’s Catalog) online.
Historical Deep Sky Objects:
List of all 152 Deep Sky Object discovered before William Herschel began

his extensive survey in September, 1782, in various formats
The Jack Bennett Catalog
of Southern Deep-Sky Objects (also available

as plain ascii file), which was contributed by

Auke Slotegraaf; thanks !
The Saguaro Astronomy Club (SAC) has compiled a
list of the 110 best NGC objects

not in Messier’s catalog. Also note the

original list by A.J. Crayon and Steve Coe; it is also

available as inexpensive booklet

(info).

This list was contributed by

Paul Dickson,

editor of the

SACnews newsletter.
The Messier Plus Marathon List
(also available as ascii file):

Wally Brown and Bob Buckner have compiled a list of 110

Deep Sky objects (75 Messiers, 34 NGCs, 1 Brocchi) suitable for a

1-night marathon session around September each year, the Messier Plus

Marathon. Messier Plus marathons have been held first by the Saguaro

Astronomy Club of Phoenix, Arizona, in

1981 and 1982, the list was

contributed by AJ Crayon.
John Caldwell’s
“Best Sky Objects from SAAO Latitude.

List of deep sky objects and double/multiple stars for Southern observers.

Contributed by Willie Koorts. [ascii file]
Glen Cozens from New South Wales, Australia, has compiled a list of
110 DEEP-SKY HIGH LIGHTS

(also available as ascii file).
Patrick Moore‘s Caldwell Catalog: Choose between our
Linked Object List or the (unlinked) Original

Caldwell Catalog

at Sky Online
The German yearbook, Ahnert’s Kalender für Sternfreunde, has
compilations of very easy deepsky objects (suitable for 2-inch telescopes),

especially useful for school and public demonstrations. These lists of a total

of 42 Northern deepsky showpieces is now

available online.
The American Association of Amateur Astronomers has created a

List of Deep Sky Objects (and double and variable stars) for Northern

hemisphere observers living in urban regions:

The AAAA Urban Astronomy Club List of Objects.

This list is presented here crosslinked to the object pages in our

Messier Catalog Online Database; also note their (unlinked)

original list.
The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (RASC) has published
several useful observing lists in their yearly Observer’s Handbook,

edited by Roy L. Bishop:
- Messier Catalog, ordered by Season of
  observation, by Alan Dyer
  
  [also available as ascii file]
- The Finest NGC Objects, list of 110, by
  Alan Dyer
- Deep Sky Challenge Objects, list of 45
  more difficult objects, including non-NGC/IC objects, by
  
  Alan Dyer and Alister Ling
The Astronomical League has provided
extra observing tours beyond the Messier objects for binocular observers,

each one for Northern and Southern Deep Sky Objects (and observers);

we have linked copies of the object lists to our pages here:
- Binocular Deep Sky observing beyond Messier
  (Northern objects)
  
  [
  
  AL’s original Binocular Deep Sky Club page]
- Southern Sky Binocular Club:
  Deep Sky observing in the Southern Sky
  
  [
  
  AL’s original Southern Sky Binocular Club page]
- They also provide their famous
  Binocular Messier Club, granting
  
  certificates for hunting down the Messier catalog with binoculars
  
  [
  
  AL’s original Binocular Messier Club page].
The Hawaii Astronomical Society
has compiled a

Beyond Messier and Caldwell list of more challenging Deep Sky objects
The astronomical computer program Ephem, an ephemeris calculator, provides
a database containing various Solar System objects, stars, all Messier

and 27 other Deep Sky Objects. Here is the list of (the 27 other)

Deep Sky Objects from the Ephem program.

[You can download

Ephem 4.28 for OS/2 here]
The Observatorio ARVAL (Venezuela)
has made their

ARVAL Catalog of Bright Objects available online; it consists of

the following parts:
- The ARVAL Catalog of Guide Stars
- The ARVAL Catalog of Bright Open Clusters
- The ARVAL Catalog of Bright Globular Clusters
- The ARVAL Catalog of Bright Galaxies
- The ARVAL Catalog of Bright Nebulae
- The ARVAL Catalog of Bright Planetary Nebulae
Erich Karkoschka, in his
Atlas für Himmelsbeobachter, lists

250 Deep Sky Objects well observable by amateurs.
The more advanced amateur may try more and other objects, e.g.
Herschel’s catalog, which is available online

thanks to Bill Arnett.
Boyd Edwards has compiled a
big observing list of 884 deep sky objects,

which he has collected from the Messier catalog, the Caldwell catalog, the

Herschel 400 list of the AL, Burnham (all objects with long description),

A. Dyer’s 110 “Finest” NGC objects (Observers Handbook 1996), and

objects discussed in Sky & Telescope. For more detail, read

Boyd’s Explanatory Notes.
Tom Hoffelder, one of the inventors of the
Messier Marathon, has compiled

an observing list of 1000 Deep Sky objects which he has named “The

Magnificient 1000”. We have here a description

and the list. Tom has hunted down all but NGC

2253 and 1663 with an 8-inch SC.
The Webb Society, in their
famous Deep-Sky Observer’s Handbook

Vol. 2, 3, and 4, has provided a numbered catalog of 700 deep-sky objects

(nebulae, star clusters, and galaxies). This catalog excludes the

bright Virgo Cluster galaxies, which

are treated in their Vol. 5 (Clusters of Galaxies).
Ronald J. Morales has published
The Amateur Astronomer’s Catalog of 500 Deep-Sky Objects
Roger N. Clark’s book,
Visual Astronomy of the Deep Sky, contains an atlas of 90 and a

catalog of 611 deep sky objects visible for better equipped amateurs.
Some historic observing lists, mostly from the 19th century, which may
still be suited as observing lists, include
- Admiral William H. Smyth,
  The Bedford Catalogue: From A Cycle of Celestial Objects, 1844.
- Rev. T.W. Webb.
  Celestial Objects for Common Telescopes, 1859.
Finally, some hardcore-observers may like to track down the whole
NGC and IC catalog by

J.L.E. Dreyer:
- Bill Arnett has provided a
  NGC Webpage linking
  
  the more important NGC and IC web resources, including a dictionary
  
  for Dreyer’s description code.
- The present author
  has provided an
  
  interactive online NGC (and IC) catalog,
  
  based on Sky Publishing’s famous NGC 2000.0 database.
- The NGC/IC Project maintains an
  online database of various versions of the NGC and IC catalogs,
  
  corrections to the catalogs, and observations of the NGC and IC
  
  deepsky objects. You may contribute your observations to their
  
  database, and generate your own observing list interactively from
  
  their facilities.