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France's First Lady Carla Bruni is said to have flouted a 200-year-old rule banning women from wearing trousers - by sporting them at the Elysee Palace in Paris. According to a new book, which traces the history of the garment, a police ruling that bans women from wearing trousers without authorisation was never repealed, which means it still stands till today. "In 1800, a decree by the police prefecture banned women from wearing trousers unless they had specific authorisation," the Daily Mail quoted historian Christine Bard, who wrote Political History of Trousers, as explaining. "The rule was never repealed - it still stands," she stated. She said that it was a social taboo, and that the right to wear trousers was the result of a struggle that reflected a shift in relations between the sexes. "Trousers were not only a symbol of male power, but of the separation of the sexes. A woman who wore trousers was accused of cross-dressing," she said. "She was seen as a threat to the natural order of things, to the social, moral and political order," she added.

Bruni flouts 200-yr-old Paris rule banning women from wearing trousers