Lewis Swift discovered NGC 317 = Sw. II-11 on 1 Oct 1885 with the 16" refractor at Warner Observatory. His position is 28 sec of RA east and 1' N of PGC 3442. He mentions a "Double star close following", but he confused the directions as the pair of stars is close preceding. This galaxy is identified as NGC 317A in the MCG as the close pair are given separate designations.

400/500mm - 17.5" (8/29/92): the SSE component of this double galaxy appeared very faint, very small, round, low even surface brightness. A mag 11 star is 1' W and a faint mag 14 star is 1' SW, forming a wide 30" double. The NNW component is the slightly brighter of the pair and appears faint, very small, very small bright core, stellar nucleus. On the POSS the SSE galaxy is the brighter component. MCG +07-03-011 lies 6' S.

600/800mm - 24" (10/5/13): this is the larger component of a close double system with NGC 317A = UGC 593 just 35" NNW (between centers). At 375x appeared fairly faint, very elongated WNW-ESE, ~45"x15", weak concentration, slightly brighter core. Two mag 11.5/13.8 stars lie 1' W. NGC 317A appeared fairly faint to moderately bright, small, fairly high surface brightness (core region) ~15". With averted vision, the core is surrounded by a thin, very low surface brightness halo increasing the diameter to 25". CGCG 536-014 lies 5.5' S, forming the isolated triplet KTG 2. It appeared faint, fairly small, elongated 3:2 WSW-ENE, 25"x18", low even surface brightness.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb