In the library of the Royal Astronomical Society, I chanced across a 19th Century picture of Charles Wolf and Georges Rayet who gave their names to this target. They were pictured in a faded late 19th Century team photo of international astronomers tasked with dividing up the night sky and mapping it to create ‘Carte du Ciel’, meaning ‘Map of the Sky’. Despite huge efforts from 20 observatories around the world, the ambitious project was only partially finished, mostly due to the vast scale of the night sky. Or, to put it another way, there’s one heck of a lot of stars up there.

Charles Wolf is top centre and Georges Rayet is bottom left.