Drizzt Do'Urden is, in the Dungeons & Dragons-based Forgotten Realms setting, a good drow ranger who has forsaken both the evil ways of his people and their home (in the Underdark).
Drizzt was born in Menzoberranzan in the noble house of Do'Urden. He was the son of Malice Do'Urden and her consort, the Do'Urden weaponmaster Zaknafein. As the third son, drow culture demanded that Drizzt be sacrificed to the spider-goddess Lolth, but the death of this older brother, Nalfein, shortly after his birth made him the second son and spared him from sacrifice.
Being a male in the matriarchal drow society, Drizzt Do'Urden suffered considerable abuse at the hands of his family in the first sixteen years of his life. His first ten years were spent in the care of his older sister Vierna; though she was far from kind, in his later years Drizzt would recall some affection for her.
As a child, Drizzt displayed amazing reflexes and showed precocious talent. Consequently, Zaknafein was able to persuade Malice that Drizzt should become a warrior instead of replacing Nalfein as the house wizard. Thus, at the age of sixteen, Drizzt began his weapons training. It was then that he began learning the skills that would lead to him become one of the most formidable swordsmen in the world of Faerūn.
At 20 years old, he went to Melee-Magthere, Menzoberranzan's warrior academy, where he excelled in his studies despite the dislike of the masters of the academy, who matched him against students three years above him (Drizzt beat them easily). His time at the academy would have been spotless (by drow standards) except for the graduation ceremony, where he disgraced himself (again by drow standards) by refusing to take part in an orgy by refusing the advances of two high priestesses (one his sister Vierna) and damning Lolth.
After graduating he took part in a surface raid in which he saved the life of an elven child (not a good thing in drow culture) by hiding her underneath her murdered mother. Zaknafein, similar to Drizzt in his morals, thought he had done it, but Lolth knew he hadn't and dropped the Do'Urden family from her favour because of it. Zaknafein then fought with Drizzt, thinking he had become like other drow, and was told the truth of the matter by Drizzt.
Unfortunately, the women of house Do'Urden, in a bid to find out why Do'Urden was no longer in Lolth's favour, were watching this battle. The end result of this is that Zaknafein offered himself as a sacrifice to spare Drizzt and Drizzt, on realising what had happened, left house Do'Urden to live in the Underdark wilderness.
Drizzt then spent some years in the Underdark, during which he was enslaved by mind flayers and then had to fight Zaknafein again, who had been made undead by Malice to find Drizzt. In the end, Zaknafein regained enough control to make himself fall into a pool of acid, destroying him.
For Malice's failure to use Zaknafein to kill Drizzt, Lolth decreed that house Do'Urden should be destroyed, and house Baenre (the most powerful house in Menzoberranzan) did just that, with only Vierna and Dinin (Drizzt's older brother) surviving.
Drizzt then realised that neither he nor anyone around him would be safe in the Underdark, so he decided to travel to the surface.
