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Dalrymple was born in Scotland in 1967(?). He is married to the artist Olivia Fraser and has three children.
He is a fellow of many prestigious literary and geographical societies, in recognition of his work. His contribution to British popular understanding of culture and history have included numerous television series and a radio show.
His first book, In Xanadu, was the result of his journey across the Asian continent, from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to Xanadu in Outer Mongolia. This was an attempt to retrace Marco Polo's footsteps along the Silk Road, along the Karakorum highway, opened in the late 1980s. The journey was taken on a multitude of types of transport and lasted for over six months. Throughout the journey, Dalrymple investigated the world of the Silk Rode as Polo would have seen it. The book won numerous awards.
This was followed by City of Djinns in 1993. The book was mainly the result of a one year stay in Delhi. Dalrymple attempts to uncover the various layers of both old and new Delhi. He examines the traumatic events of the Partition of IndiaThe Partition of India was the division of the Indian subcontinent that occurred following World War II. Very shortly after being awarded of dominion status by the British Empire (independence), on August 15, 1947, the colony of British India was divided, the 1984 riots after the assassination of Indira GandhiIndira Priyadarshini Gandhi ( ( November 19, 1917 October 31, 1984) was Prime Minister of India from January 19, 1966 to March 24, 1977, and from January 14, 1980 until her assassination in 1984. Early years She was the only child of Jawaharlal Nehru, the, the ancient Hindu origin of the city, Mughal and British Colonial ruleThe British Empire in the early decades of the 20th century, held sway over a population of 400 500 million people (roughly a quarter of the world's population), and covered nearly 30 million square kilometres, (roughly two-fifths of the world's land area, as well as the SikhA Sikh is a follower of Sikhism, a religious faith originating in the Punjab. The word Sikh is derived from the Sanskrit word shishya which means disciple or student (although this is disputed by some). In the Punjabi language the word Sikh also means to community. The book follows his established style of historical digressions, tied in with contemporary events and a multitude of anecdotes.
His third book From the Holy Mountain (1997) saw him attempt to trace the ties of Eastern Orthodox congregations scattered in the Middle East to their ancient origins. The next book, The Age of Kali (1998), saw him return to the subject of India. The book is a collection of essays collected through almost a decade of travel around the sub-continent. It deals with many controversial subjects such as SatiHinduism Suicide In Hinduism, Sati also called Dakshayani is one of the daughters of Prasuti and Daksha. She loved Shiva, but her father, Daksha, forbade her marriage to Shiva. She married him anyway, and Daksha got revenge by not inviting Shiva to a fest, the casteVarna (caste) Caste is derived from a Portuguese word for lineage, breed or race, casta''. The term caste when used in human culture is usually in conjunction with the social division in Hindu society, particularly in India. This term is also used in ento wars in India and political corruption and terrorism.
His fifth major book White Mughals (2002) is a novel based on the historical research pertaining to an affair during the time of British colonialism. The affair saw a British dignitary convert to Islam and marry a woman of royal Mughal descent. The work, a fictionalisation based on a true story and complete with the analysis of sources, has won acclaim as both a work of literary and historical merit.