Lewis Swift discovered IC 2119 = Sw. XI-74 on 30 Nov 1897 and reported "eeeF; pS; bet 2 st; close to eeeF D*; eee diff." There is nothing at his position but 9' N is ESO 553-005. Howe was the first to make this identification in his review of Swift's IC objects (MN, Nov. 1900) and reported "Swift's declination is nearly 10' in error. He says "close to eeeF D*." The double is of mag 12.5 and 12.5, distance 90", and angle 210°. The nebula is near the northern one of the two stars." Howe's corrected position is accurate and was used in the IC 2 position, but Dreyer made a 10° error in the declination. Corwin also points out that Howe made an error in his comments about the double star, which is much closer to the southeast. Due to the IC error, this galaxy isn't labelled IC 2119 in many sources, including ESO, PGC and LEDA.

600/800mm - 24" (2/13/18): at 200x; fairly faint, fairly small, oval 4:3 SW-NE, ~35"x25", brighter core. A mag 14.6 star is 50" ESE of center. At 282x, the brighter core contains a stellar or quasi-stellar nucleus. A very faint 16th mag star is 20" SW of the mag 14.6 star.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb