NGC 6380 is a globular cluster located in the constellation Scorpius. It was originally discovered by James Dunlop in 1826, and he named it Dun 538. Eight years later, in 1834, it was independently rediscovered by John Herschel and he named it H 3688. The cluster was re-rediscovered in 1959 by Paris Pişmiş, who catalogued it as Tonantzintla 1 — and referred to it as Pişmiş 25. Until the 1950s NGC 6380 was thought to be an open cluster. It was A. D. Thackeray who realised that it was in fact a globular cluster. Nowadays, this cluster is reliably recognised in widely available catalogues as a globular cluster, and referred to simply as NGC 6380.^[2]

NGC 6380
NGC 6380 as seen through the Hubble Space Telescope
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Constellation	Scorpius
Right ascension	17h 34m 28.00s[1]
Declination	−39° 04′ 09.0″[1]
Distance	35,500 ly (10,900 pc)[2]
Apparent magnitude (V)	11.31[3]
Apparent dimensions (V)	12.1′ × 12.1′[2]
Physical characteristics
Metallicity	${\displaystyle {\begin{smallmatrix}\left[{\ce {Fe}}/{\ce {H}}\right]\end{smallmatrix}}}$ = -0.75[3] dex
Other designations	GCl 68, Tonantzintla 1, Pişmiş 25[1]
See also: Globular cluster, List of globular clusters