In the course of an extensive campaign to measure radial velocities of galaxies in a selected sample of compact groups photometrically studied by de Carvalho et al . ( 1994 ) , we report the discovery of a system very rich in starburst galaxies and AGNs . This is the system HCG 16 of Hickson ’ s ( 1982 ) catalog of CGs . The 7 brightest galaxies form a kinematical group with bi-weighted estimate mean velocity of V _ { BI } = 3959 \pm 66 km s ^ { -1 } , dispersion \sigma _ { BI } = 86 \pm 55 km s ^ { -1 } , a median radius \langle { R } \rangle = 0.197 Mpc , a mean density of \langle { D } \rangle = 217 gal Mpc ^ { -3 } and a total absolute magnitude of M _ { B } = -22.1 . From their spectral characteristics , we have identified one Seyfert 2 galaxy , two LINERs and three starburst galaxies . Thus , HCG 16 appears to be a dense concentration of active galaxies . In our sample of 17 Hickson groups , HCG 16 is unique in this regard , suggesting that it is an uncommon structure in the nearby universe .