Messier 9 is a ball of stars (globular cluster) in the southern constellation Ophiuchus. This image from the Digitised Sky Survey 2 shows a wide-field view of globular cluster Messier 9 and its surroundings, imaged by a ground-based telescope. Messier 9 lies 25,800 light years from Earth. Immediately to the right of Messier 9 is the dark cloud Barnard 64. Charles Messier, the 18th century French astronomer, catalogued over 100 galaxies and clusters. Through the telescopes available at the time, comets, nebulae, globular clusters and galaxies appeared just as faint, diffuse blobs.