Markarian's Chain is a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster.

When viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line.

The other galaxies seen in the chain were discovered by William Herschel[1] and are now known primarily by their catalog numbers in John Louis Emil Dreyer's New General Catalogue, published in 1888.

[2] It was ultimately named after the Armenian astrophysicist, Benjamin Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s.

The bright members of the chain are visible through small telescopes.