The American zoologist Gerrit Smith Miller Jr. first described a golden-bellied treeshrew from North Pagai Island that was part of a zoological collection obtained by the United States National Museum. He considered it a distinct species as this type specimen differed from the common treeshrew by larger teeth and skull, darker coloured fur on the back and a more coarsely grizzled tail.Miller, G. S. Jr. (1903). Seventy New Malayan Mammals. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections 45: 1–73.
