[3][4] The Brazilian ruby was described by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1780 in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux.

[5] The bird was also illustrated in a hand-colored plate engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet in the Planches Enluminées D'Histoire Naturelle which was produced under the supervision of Edme-Louis Daubenton to accompany Buffon's text.

[6] Neither the plate caption nor Buffon's description included a scientific name but in 1783 the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert coined the binomial name Trochilus rubicauda in his catalogue of the Planches Enluminées.

[8] The Brazilian ruby was at one time the only species in the genus Clytolaema that was introduced by the ornithologist and bird artist John Gould in 1853.

[14] The Brazilian ruby is found in eastern and southeastern Brazil from Bahia south to Rio Grande do Sul.

[14] The Brazilian ruby feeds on nectar from a wide variety of flowering plants and trees, both native and introduced.

It makes a cup nest of soft plant material with lichen on the outside and places it on a horizontal branch, typically 3 to 10 m (10 to 30 ft) above the ground.

[1] It occurs in several protected areas, and is "[c]ommon throughout [its] range...and readily accepts man-made habitats like tree-filled gardens, parks and plantations.