Short answers, pulled from the story.
Timur, also known as Tamerlane, was a Turco-Mongol conqueror, first ruler of the Timurid dynasty, and founder of the Timurid Empire over modern-day Afghanistan, Iran, and Central Asia. He defeated the Golden Horde, the Mamluk Sultanate, the Ottoman Empire, and the Delhi Sultanate, becoming the most powerful ruler in the Muslim world. He was undefeated in battle.
Timur was called Timur the Lame, or Temur-i Lang in Persian, because of injuries that disabled him for life. Around 1363 he was struck by two arrows, one in his right leg and one in his right hand, where he lost two fingers. The Persian name Temur-i Lang is the origin of Tamerlane, the name used in the West.
Timur was born in the 1320s in Transoxiana, near the city of Kesh, now Shahrisabz in Uzbekistan, about 80 kilometers south of Samarkand. He was born into the Turkicized Mongol confederation of the Barlas. Later dynastic histories claimed a birthdate of the 8th of April 1336, but most sources from his lifetime point to the late 1320s.
At the battle for Delhi on the 17th of December 1398, Timur defeated war elephants by loading camels with wood and hay, setting the loads on fire, and prodding the animals so they charged the elephants. The panicked elephants turned and stampeded back into their own lines, giving Timur an easy victory over Nasir-ud-Din Mahmud Shah Tughluq.
Timur died on the 17th or the 18th of February 1405 at Farab, after falling ill while camped on the far side of the Syr Daria. He died during a winter campaign against Ming China, before ever reaching the Chinese border. His body was sent to Samarkand and buried in the Gur-e-Amir tomb.
Timur was the grandfather of Ulugh Beg, the astronomer and mathematician who ruled Central Asia from 1411 to 1449. He was also the great-great-great-grandfather of Babur, born in 1483, who founded the Mughal Empire. His youngest son, Shah Rukh, took his throne in 1409 after a civil war among his descendants.