Hazal and Pants

Did the Sages of the Talmud wear pants? The question itself is a bit overly simplistic because the Sages of the Talmud lived in (at least) two different areas of the world over a number of centuries. It is quite possible, indeed probable, that their styles of dress differed from one era and place to another. Nevertheless...

Rashi (responsum no. 262) wrote that the Sages did not wear pants, but rather wore some sort of robe, and brought evidence for his assertion from the Mishnah in Shabbos (120a) that list eighteen items of clothing one may save from a fire on Shabbos and pants are not a part of the list.

My rabbi noted that the Gemara in Shabbos (12a) states that one may not use a candle on Shabbos to be able to detect between one's clothing and one's wife's. Rashi (s.v. mida yadi) explains that men's clothing is shorter because they work in the field and women's have wider handles etc. Nowhere does he mention that men wore pants.

I thought I could bring a proof from Bekhoros 44b that, when the need suddenly arises and there are no other options, one may urinate in public. If one is wearing pants, the only way to do so without soiling oneself is to lower the pants, thereby exposing oneself in public. I find it hard to believe that the Gemara was permitting that. However, if one is only wearing a robe, one can merely aim down and urinate without exposing oneself (pardon the graphic description). However, upon closer examination, from the fact that Shmuel seems to have urinated in public under cover of his cloak and his father complained that the average person lacks a cloak, it is possible that the Gemara actually permits exposing oneself in order to avoid the physical danger of "holding it in" for too long. So no proof.

R. Daniel Sperber (Modern Scholarship in the Study of Torah, Shalom Carmy ed., p. 199) points out that the Mishnah about the eighteen garments, in the Yerushalmi, lists something called "avrikin". The Arukh (s.v. berikin) explains that this word corresponds to the Latin braccae (similar to "breeches"), i.e. trousers. There is evidence that some people in Roman times wore pants.

R. Sperber also points out that pants are listed as a garment in the Mishnah in Keilim (27:6). However, that could merely list it as a known garment at that time - since the priests wore pants in the Temple service - and does not indicate that it was normally worn (outside the Temple service).

However, note that both of R. Sperber's proofs are from the Mishnah. It could very well be that this is only indicative of Rome-influenced Palestine and not Persia, or of the Mishnaic era and not the Talmudic period.