12 Victoria is a large main-belt asteroid, orbiting the Sun with a period of 3.56 years and an eccentricity of 0.221.

It is a stony (S-type) asteroid, about 112–124 km across with an albedo of 0.18 and a rotation period of 8.66 hours.

The goddess Victoria (Nike for the Greeks) was the daughter of Styx by the Titan Pallas.

A. Gould, editor of the prestigious Astronomical Journal, adopted the alternate name Clio (now used by 84 Klio), proposed by the discoverer.

However, W. C. Bond, of the Harvard College Observatory, then the highest authority on astronomy in America, held that the mythological condition was fulfilled and the name therefore acceptable, and his opinion eventually prevailed.