Although Multiton is regarded by many just as another type of Singleton and not even a design pattern by itself, I like to give it the credits it deserves and put it next to it’s little brother on the same rank of importance in the world of design patterns.
Anyway, one thing is clear: it resembles so much the Singleton pattern that in all the technical books you will always find it explained right next to this one. Some books, like Addison-Wesley’s “Design Patterns” refer to it as “Registry of Singletons” instead of Multiton.
You already probably know what a Singleton is (if not I advise you to read this article first, where I explained what’s a Singleton and where you should use it), so let’s see what new things Multiton comes with.