Lady Evelyn Cobbold (1867 - January 1963), who also adopted the Arabic

Arabic language

Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...

 name Zainab, was a Scottish noblewoman and convert

Religious conversion

Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...

 to Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

. Born in Edinburgh in 1867, she was the eldest daughter of Charles Adolphus Murray, 7th Earl of Dunmore

Earl of Dunmore

Earl of Dunmore is a title in the Peerage of Scotland. It was created in 1686 for Lord Charles Murray, second son of John Murray, 1st Marquess of Atholl. He was made Lord Murray of Blair, Moulin and Tillimet and Viscount of Fincastle at the same time, also in the Peerage of Scotland. He was...

 and Lady Gertrude Coke, daughter of the Second Earl of Leicester

Thomas Coke, 2nd Earl of Leicester

Thomas William Coke, 2nd Earl of Leicester KG , known as Viscount Coke from 1837 to 1842, was a British peer....

.

Evelyn achieved celebrity at age 65, in 1933, when she became the first British-born Muslim woman to perform the pilgrimage

Hajj

The Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of the largest pilgrimages in the world, and is the fifth pillar of Islam, a religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by every able-bodied Muslim who can afford to do so...

 to Mecca

Mecca

Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...

. In 1934, a personal account of her trip was published entitled Pilgrimage to Mecca. An excerpt from her work can be found in Michael Wolfe

Michael Wolfe

Michael Wolfe is an American poet, author, and the President and Executive Producer of . He is also a frequent lecturer on Islamic issues at universities across the United States including Harvard, Georgetown, Stanford, SUNY Buffalo, and Princeton...

's book One Thousand Roads to Mecca

One Thousand Roads to Mecca

One Thousand Roads to Mecca: Ten Centuries of Travelers Writing About the Muslim Pilgrimage is a collection of travel journals edited by Michael Wolfe and published in 1999...

.