When the tradition that "only women wear skirts" came out?

[Cesrate]

Despite of exceptions in the world, this tradition seems to be here since ancient times in [Edit] some regions of (sorry I forgot to add this)[/Edit] Europe, Asia, etc. When and why?

Edited August 6, 2013 by Cesrate

[astropapi1]

It's like having long hair. Couple of months ago, my hair could barely reach my shoulders, but every sinGLE PERSON IN THE STREET [/Ragemodeoff] kept telling me it was wrong.

Or having an earring. A week ago we were on a camping trip and a friend of mine had to take off his earring (~2cm diameter, it was like this: http://www.argos.co.uk/wcsstore/argos/images/6-2096012A70UC500093M.jpg) because "we were going for a run", but the girls in my class (which were wearing stuff like this: http://free-tatting.com/img/earring-4.jpg) weren't told anything.

Damn double standards.

[Diche Bach]

As far as the "Western world" goes, I think "wearing skirts" was actually perfectly normal for men and boys for _most_ of recorded history. By Western we could say ancient Mesopotamia and everything that occurred later than in time and westerly in geography and I think we'd be safe to say that, _most_ of the societies in that broad geographic and temporal period would've regarded "skirts" as perfectly normal and acceptable for men and boys. Indeed, I don't even know when pants starting being worn in that part of the world.

Sorry I don't know much at all about "Eastern Cultures" so this generalization could be totally wrong when it comes to ancient India, Thailand, China . . .

As far as when "wearing the pants" became a norm for men in Western world . . . well, I think it is still somewhat varying even today, though tis true I guess that at this point, the norm is fairly prevalent throughout the entire world, and not simply the "West."

I would speculate that the norm of men wearing pants and not skirts was already full in place in "the West" by no later than 1400 as I cannot ever recall seeing men or boys portrayed as wearing skirts or skirt-like garments in any images from that time period onward (exceptions like kilts, etc., accepted).

I think this allows to pin down: sometime between the fall of the Roman Empire and the time of Henry the VIIIth but when exactly in Western Medieval history the skirt became "abnormal" for men and boys I could not guess. Heh, probably about the same time that homosexuality became "abnormalized"

[Seret]

IIRC wearing of trousers was a Germanic thing. They weren't popular amongst the Mediterranean cultures that had been dominant up until then, but are nice if you're a cold-climate northern European. So if I was to take a guess I'd say that it was the spread of Germanic tribes and eventually the Franks that popularised it.

[Tw1]

It's like having long hair. Couple of months ago, my hair could barely reach my shoulders, but every sinGLE PERSON IN THE STREET [/Ragemodeoff] kept telling me it was wrong.

:

Well, glad I'm not where you are. Mine goes past my shoulders.

[Diche Bach]

IIRC wearing of trousers was a Germanic thing. They weren't popular amongst the Mediterranean cultures that had been dominant up until then, but are nice if you're a cold-climate northern European. So if I was to take a guess I'd say that it was the spread of Germanic tribes and eventually the Franks that popularised it.

Yep, that sounds quite sensible!

[magnemoe]

IIRC wearing of trousers was a Germanic thing. They weren't popular amongst the Mediterranean cultures that had been dominant up until then, but are nice if you're a cold-climate northern European. So if I was to take a guess I'd say that it was the spread of Germanic tribes and eventually the Franks that popularised it.

Yes, also the center of power moved north add that riding became more and more common. Far more common than in roman times. Probably that stopped skirts from coming back.

Now another fun fact is that men skirts usually was shorter than the females. It was exceptions, men's formal outfits was usually long. Dates back to the Egyptians.

[drakesdoom]

Well the armored skirts that warriors wore in the roman and earlier times were short because of how the balance of weapons sat at the time.

Basically a light leg hit wouldn't matter much as with swords it would always be on the outside where you will not bleed out since the main veins are on the inside of the leg. A strong hit that could cut through the leg was not worth adding armor for for two reasons. First without hardened steel armor was much heavier for the same protection as compared to later times. Secondly even with armored legs that same blow would then just sweep your legs and then it would be trivial to finish you off on the ground. The skirts only real purpose was protecting the jewels.

[Lanfranc]

IIRC wearing of trousers was a Germanic thing. They weren't popular amongst the Mediterranean cultures that had been dominant up until then, but are nice if you're a cold-climate northern European. So if I was to take a guess I'd say that it was the spread of Germanic tribes and eventually the Franks that popularised it.

Beyond just being unpopular, in ca. 400 AD it was actually made illegal to wear trousers inside the City of Rome – at this point, the Roman military had become so dominated by the various Germanic and Gothic tribes that the trousers they typically wore were literally considered military attire, which you traditionally could not wear in Rome itself, and which was certainly not appropriate for "proper Romans" to wear anyway.

[Cesrate]

Hum... An assumption is skirts are used to be unisex clothes, but as men found it's unsuitable for working, skirts were gradually abandoned by men and became female-only clothes(despite of some exceptions).

[jwenting]

Hum... An assumption is skirts are used to be unisex clothes, but as men found it's unsuitable for working, skirts were gradually abandoned by men and became female-only clothes(despite of some exceptions).

incorrect. Skirts are quite handy for working, though the current trend of making them without any pockets and it being unfashionable for men to wear shoulder bags or other accessories to store tools and stuff causes impracticality.

But the same is true for skinny pants, which are all the rage.

There's at least one successful company making skirts for men designed for the working man, sturdy material, lots of pockets: http://www.utilikilts.com/

Looks mighty comfortable.

[Seret]

as men found it's unsuitable for working, skirts were gradually abandoned by men

If the Egyptians could build the pyramids in kilts, and the Roman army could fight and march it's way through everybody they came across then I'd say there's no big problem with hard labour in a skirt.