Instruments like the violin that use a bow to produce a sound are called bowed stringed instruments. The Arabian rabab and the rebec, which came from the orient in the middle ages and was played widely in Spain and France in the fifteenth century, are said to be the ancestors of the violin. Near the end of the middle ages, a bowed stringed instrument called a fiddle appeared in Europe.In the East, the Chinese erhu and morin khur evolved from the rabab, and so they are relatives of the violin.