This is somewhat of a musical ancestral hunt.... =)
There are rumours that the musical bow was developed from the hunting bow but to be honest: no evidence has been brought up to warrant the thesis for the earlier times. In Africa are tribes using old hunting bows for playing music on them, but they may not have done so in times long passed.
This is the first musical bow I have built. The string is an old high e from a guitar. To make the musical bow sound loud enough to record it with the build-in equipment, I pressed one end of the bow against the iMac; usually you'd take either the end of the wood or the string between your teeth or have a calabash attached to the bow. As you may hear I pluck the string; there are other methods like rubbing &c.