Named after Joan Gideon Loten, who was the Dutch governor of colonial Ceylon, it is very similar to the purple sunbird that is found in the same areas and also tends to hover at flowers for nectar, but can be distinguished by the longer bill, the maroon band on the breast and brownish wings.

The male in winter has an eclipse plumage with a yellowish underside resembling that of the female but having a broad central streak of dark metallic violet from the chin to the belly.

[4][5][6] The existence of an eclipse plumage in the adult male has been questioned by Rasmussen & Anderton (2005) due to the lack of specimens in evidence.

Soc., Calcutta, has the winter or currucaria plumage of the last, viz., a central glossy green stripe on the throat and breast, and a spot on the shoulders of the wings; otherwise as in the female.

I do not recollect seeing the bird in this plumage in Malabar, where I had many opportunities of observing it, and rather think that it must have been a young bird.The name of the bird commemorates Joan Gideon Loten, the Dutch governor to Sri Lanka (Ceylon) who commissioned the artist Pieter Cornelis de Bevere to illustrate the natural history of the region from living and collected specimens.

Naturae, from specimens sent to him by General Loten, Governor of Ceylon, and named in honour of that gentleman, "Habitat in Zeylona.

"Gmelin confused this with African species and many publications of that time include inaccurate information: Certhia Lotenia, or Loten's creeper, is a native of Ceylon and Madagascar.

It builds its nest of the down of plants, and is subjected to the hostility of a spider in those countries, nearly as large as itself, which pursues it with extreme ardour, and delights in sucking the blood of its young.Found only in peninsular India and Sri Lanka.

In the interior of the mass the birds press out a more or less globular chamber, lining the walls with vegetable down, and generally providing a little cave of cobweb over the entrance, which is at one side.

If spider's webs are not available, they appear on occasions to construct a little pear-shaped, hanging structure like that of the next species.Salim Ali notes that the species is exceptional among Indian sunbirds in not having cobwebs on the exterior.