Standard advice is to lay out between one third and a half the price of the violin on a bow. I don't know who suggested to John that he should go for twice the price of the fiddle, but I wouldn't pay too much heed to that! As it happens, I paid nearly as much for my current bow as for the instrument I play it with; that was pushing it, but about right in the circumstances given the nature of the fiddle. Any more would have been extravagant and self indulgent; and beyond my capabilities to take proper advantage of in any case.