Is it possible to trace the delegation path for a DNS lookup?

Solution 1:

Does this do the job for you?

dig +trace google.com

From the man page:

+[no]trace Toggle tracing of the delegation path from the root name servers for the name being looked up. Tracing is disabled by default. When tracing is enabled, dig makes iterative queries to resolve the name being looked up. It will follow referrals from the root servers, showing the answer from each server that was used to resolve the lookup.

Solution 2:

For Windows you can trace your dns query with

nslookup -debug google.at

You can also trace it online (of couse from another host) on http://www.simpledns.com/lookup-dg.aspx