diff -r fe72160ea2a3 Doc/library/sqlite3.rst
--- a/Doc/library/sqlite3.rst	Sat Mar 26 19:59:02 2011 +0100
+++ b/Doc/library/sqlite3.rst	Sat Mar 26 22:52:15 2011 -0500
@@ -565,11 +565,15 @@
 
 .. attribute:: Cursor.description
 
-   This read-only attribute provides the column names of the last query. To
-   remain compatible with the Python DB API, it returns a 7-tuple for each
-   column where the last six items of each tuple are :const:`None`.
+   This read-only attribute provides the column names and types of the last query.
+   To remain compatible with the Python DB API, it returns a 7-tuple for each
+   column where the last 6 items of each tuple are :const:`None`.
 
-   It is set for ``SELECT`` statements without any matching rows as well.
+   Column name and type is set for ``SELECT`` statements without any matching rows
+   as well.
+
+   Column type will return ``SQLITE_NULL``, type code 5, for all the columns if the
+   table is empty.
 
 .. _sqlite3-row-objects:
 
diff -r fe72160ea2a3 Lib/sqlite3/dbapi2.py
--- a/Lib/sqlite3/dbapi2.py	Sat Mar 26 19:59:02 2011 +0100
+++ b/Lib/sqlite3/dbapi2.py	Sat Mar 26 22:52:15 2011 -0500
@@ -52,6 +52,22 @@
 
 Binary = buffer
 
+class _DBTypeSet():
+	def __init__(self, type_codes):
+		self._codes = type_codes
+
+	def __eq__(self, other):
+		return other in self._codes
+
+	def __ne__(self, other):
+		return other not in self._codes
+
+STRING = _DBTypeSet([SQLITE3_TEXT,])
+BINARY = _DBTypeSet([SQLITE_BLOB,])
+NUMBER = _DBTypeSet([SQLITE_INTEGER, SQLITE_FLOAT,])
+DATETIME = _DBTypeSet([])
+ROWID = _DBTypeSet([])
+
 def register_adapters_and_converters():
     def adapt_date(val):
         return val.isoformat()
diff -r fe72160ea2a3 Modules/_sqlite/cursor.c
--- a/Modules/_sqlite/cursor.c	Sat Mar 26 19:59:02 2011 +0100
+++ b/Modules/_sqlite/cursor.c	Sat Mar 26 22:52:15 2011 -0500
@@ -268,6 +268,11 @@
     }
 }
 
+PyObject* _pysqlite_build_column_type(int coltype)
+{
+	return PyInt_FromLong((long)coltype);
+}
+
 PyObject* pysqlite_unicode_from_string(const char* val_str, int optimize)
 {
     const char* check;
@@ -703,7 +708,7 @@
                         goto error;
                     }
                     PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 0, _pysqlite_build_column_name(sqlite3_column_name(self->statement->st, i)));
-                    Py_INCREF(Py_None); PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 1, Py_None);
+                    PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 1, _pysqlite_build_column_type(sqlite3_column_type(self->statement->st, i)));
                     Py_INCREF(Py_None); PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 2, Py_None);
                     Py_INCREF(Py_None); PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 3, Py_None);
                     Py_INCREF(Py_None); PyTuple_SetItem(descriptor, 4, Py_None);
diff -r fe72160ea2a3 Modules/_sqlite/module.c
--- a/Modules/_sqlite/module.c	Sat Mar 26 19:59:02 2011 +0100
+++ b/Modules/_sqlite/module.c	Sat Mar 26 22:52:15 2011 -0500
@@ -262,6 +262,12 @@
     {"PARSE_DECLTYPES", PARSE_DECLTYPES},
     {"PARSE_COLNAMES", PARSE_COLNAMES},
 
+    {"SQLITE_INTEGER", SQLITE_INTEGER},
+    {"SQLITE_FLOAT", SQLITE_FLOAT},
+    {"SQLITE_BLOB", SQLITE_BLOB},
+    {"SQLITE_NULL", SQLITE_NULL},
+    {"SQLITE3_TEXT", SQLITE3_TEXT},
+
     {"SQLITE_OK", SQLITE_OK},
     {"SQLITE_DENY", SQLITE_DENY},
     {"SQLITE_IGNORE", SQLITE_IGNORE},