“Take two fabric pieces for my two legs, the lion cloth and the waist band: And put them together into one.” This must have been the brief that the first trouser tailor had Got.
Before men started wearing the crotch-covering legging we call trousers, everybody wore skirts in one form or fashion – whether it was as loincloths, tunics, togas, kilts, etc. Trousers or breeches, codpieces, tights etc. became the below-the-belt attire thanks to the rise of horseback infantries. The oldest known trousers are found at the Yanghai cemetery in Turpan, Xinjiang, China, dated to the period between the 13th and the 10th century BC. Made of wool, the trousers had straight legs and wide crotches, and were likely made for horseback riding.
In Japan, where the traditional dress is the kimono but where samurais wore baggy trousers. The connection between pants and horseriding also explains why women stuck to skirts until recently — except, of course, for the female Amazon warriors. They wore pants.Trousers first enter recorded history in the 6th century BC, with the appearance of horse-riding Iranian peoples in Greek ethnography.
This period marked the shift from settled farming communities to nomadic lifestyles of horseback in Central Asia. The riders needed to protect their legs and genitals when riding astride on horses or even camels. It was the invention of the crotch that led to the era of the pants. The earliest design of the trousers was where the crotch joined the legs with the abdominal section and waist, combining the four pieces of the leggings-loincloth waistband into a single, conveniently worn garment.
It was not just the Persians that were wearing pants, but also the Bactrians and the Armenians – men as well as women. Republican Rome however abhorred trousers – calling them the mark of barbarians – and regarded draped clothing as a symbol of civilization. But when the Empire expanded beyond the Mediterranean basin, however, the greater warmth provided by trousers led to their adoption.
Wearing pants was common in Europe during the eighth century, when the Roman Empire fell. In the 17th and 18th centuries, sailors wore baggy trousers known as galligaskins. Sailors also pioneered the wearing of jeans, trousers made of denim. These became more popular in the late 19th century in the American West because of their ruggedness and durability. Simple knee breeches, fastened at first under the knee with ribbons and then later with buckles or buttons, were worn by most upper-class men in the eighteenth century until they began to be replaced during the French Revolution by the long work pants of working class revolutionaries (the sans culottes-”without breeches,”
socalled because they wore trousers instead).
The trousers of the first half of the nineteenth century had varying styles; some were extremely tight, others were broadly pleated trousers (Russian or Cossack pants), and sharply flared, below-the-knee matelot trousers. In the 1830s, trousers were long, close fitting, and equipped with straps that fit under the soles of the feet. In the 1850s, pants legs were looser, and the old trouser fly was replaced by a concealed, buttoned middle slit. The former relatively colorful palette grew increasingly sober from the 1860s on, as dark colours and plain materials became usual in everyday and evening clothing.
All trousers were pull-ons until the nineteenth century, when front closures using buttons were introduced. At the beginning of the twentieth century, pleats and cuffs completed the development of the daytime and evening trouser.
WOMEN AND PANTS
Based on Deuteronomy 22:5 in the Bible (“The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man”), some groups, including the Amish, Hutterites, some Mennonites, some Baptists, a few Church of Christ groups, and most Orthodox Jews, believe that women should not wear trousers, but only skirts and dresses. These groups do permit women to wear underpants as long as they are hidden. By contrast, many Muslim sects approve of pants as they are considered more modest than any skirt that is shorter than ankle length Western women, meanwhile, continued wearing skirts, and not just simple wrap-around numbers.
We’re talking multi-layered, heavy, floor-length ensembles often further supported and puffed out with the assistance of cage crinoline, petticoats, bustles, or other clunky foundation garments, depending on the era. Although women had been wearing trousers for outdoor work thousands of years earlier in the Western world, by the time of Christianization it had become taboo for women to wear trousers. Starting around the mid-19th century, Wigan pit brow girls scandalized Victorian society by wearing trousers while working at the local coal mines.
They wore skirts over their trousers and rolled them up to their waists to keep them out of the way. Although pit brow lasses worked above ground at the pit-head, their task of sorting and shovelling coal involved hard manual labour, so wearing the usual long skirts of the time would have greatly hindered their movements.
In the 19th century, recognizing not only the discomfort but also the health and safety hazards of wearing the weighty skirts that swept up street trash, impeded walking (especially down stairs) and posed fire hazards In 1851, Amelia Bloomer debuted her signature shocking ensemble of loose-fitting ankle-length trousers—essentially bifurcated petticoats—underneath a shorter dress. But even with the popularization of the bicycle and younger women adopting bloomers as riding outfits, it would still be a long while before pants would become an all-season, any-occasion women’s wardrobe staple.
It was Eastern culture that inspired French designer Paul Poiret (1879–1944) to be one of the first to design pants for women. In 1913 Poiret created loose-fitting, wide-leg trousers for women called harem.
pants, which were based on the costumes of the popular opera Sheherazade. His harem pant, as seen on Downton Abbey, made the cover of Vogue in 1913. Billowy slacks were becoming more commonplace in its pages by the 1930s, and on the pages of celebrity trades that showcased some Hollywood A-listers including Marlene Dietrich and Katharine Hepburn wearing them on and off screen.
Further, in Britain during World War II, because of the rationing of clothing, many women took to wearing their husbands’ civilian clothes, including their trousers, to work while their husbands were away from home serving in the armed forces. This was partly because they were seen as practical workwear and partly to allow women to keep their clothing allowance for other uses. As this practice of wearing trousers became more widespread and as the men’s clothing wore out, replacements were needed. By the summer of 1944, it was reported that sales of women’s trousers were five times more than they had been in the previous year.
