Leyla Bedirxani (Leyla Bedir Khan) was often been announced as a Kurdish princess or a Kurdish star. She was born in İstanbul. She had to move to Egypt with her family when she was a child. After her father's death, she and her mother went to live in Vienna, where she took her first dancing lessons. She started a dancing career afterward, and by 1924 she starred at the Vienna Konzerthaus. Leyla left for France to pursue her career. While staying in Paris, she studied dances of the Indian and Persian cultures as well as of the Zoroastrian rites for a year. She is the first known Kurdish modern dancer.