Southern binary galaxies. I. A sample of isolated pairs.

A catalogue of binary galaxies with 621 pairs has been determined by applying a surface density enhancement procedure to {\it The Surface Photometry Catalogue of the ESO-Uppsala Galaxies}. The method does not require any redshift information. An additional restriction, based on objective criteria that take into account the completeness of the source catalogue, led to a sample of 189 isolated pairs which are listed. We have obtained the optical luminosity function of binary galaxies in the catalogue, from which we estimate that the luminosity density of galaxies in binaries is $\sim$4% of that found for field galaxies. The general properties of our sample are similar to those from CPG and CMG.