NGC 1803 galaxy taken by NASA's Hubble telescope first discovered in 1834

The NGC 1803 galaxy is more than 200 million light years from Earth. This beautiful galaxy is within the constellation of Pictor, also known as the Painter’s Easel.

NGC 1803 is part of a pair of galaxies and is near the nebulous lenticular galaxy PGC 16720.

Astronomer John Herschel discovered the galaxy in 1834. Herschel came from a long line of great astronomers. His father, William Herschel, made many contributions to astronomy and his aunt, Caroline Herschel, did as well. William Herschel categorized many of the objects we see in the night sky while Caroline Herschel discovered many of the nebulas and comets we see. 

John Herschel worked on the General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars that was the basis of the catalog currently used today by astronomers. The current system is John Louis Emil Dreyer’s New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars, or New General Catalogue.

The name, NGC, has been given to many bodies in the galaxy, including the famous NGC 1803. Dreyer described NGC 1803 as “faint, small and round.”