Apart from the few largest bodies over 400 km in diameter, such as 1 Ceres and 4 Vesta, most asteroids appear to have been significantly fractured, or are even rubble piles.

The shape reconstruction from light curves has been described as quite spherical with large planar, nonconvex parts of the surface.

In 1988 there was a search for satellites or dust orbiting this asteroid using the UH88 telescope at the Mauna Kea Observatories, but none were found.

Asteroids discovered prior to Massalia were assigned iconic symbols, like the ones traditionally used to designate the planets.

However, astronomers had begun to phase out this practice with the discovery of 16 Psyche in March 1852, and 20 Massalia (being the first object in the Solar System with a non-mythological name)[3] was the first asteroid that was not assigned an iconic symbol.