Guillaume Bigourdan discovered IC 3259 = Big. 293 = Sn. 16, along with IC 3267, on 23 Apr 1895. Schwassmann measured an accurate position (used in the IC 2) on 4 Nov 1899 using a plate taken by Wolf at the Königstuhl Observatory.

400/500mm - 17.5" (3/28/87): faint, fairly large, very diffuse. Located 3.2' ENE of a mag 10 star and 5' NNW of NGC 4341 = IC 3260 in the NGC 4343 group.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb