In this case it's actually the same for men, or at least pretty close.

It has always been a Cuirass.

In Morrowind gotten by pillaging Divayth Fyr's dungeon .

In Oblivion by doing Hircine's bidding.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Cuirass_of_the_Savior%27s_Hide

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Saviour%27s_Hide

No one is arguing that it hasn't always been a cuirass, but when the greaves and cuirass slot have been combined into one, I would think the logical thing to do would to be add some sort of leggings to it, even if it's just a pair of simple leather pants. Any historical significance of being pantless aside, I personally would wear something to cover my legs when fighting monsters and bandits in a snowy northern land, and I'd like to imagine my character would do the same. For me, the lack of pants on certain armors is my biggest gripe (others have mentioned a lack of sleaves and chest exposure as well), and honestly it shouldn't be too difficult to fix that in Nifskope once it's been fully updated to handle the new .nif's in Skyrim. I fully intend to just add the pants from the bandit armor to the other armors that need it.

Seriously? We're at such a point that some people can't bear the sight of pantless armour?

Way to completely miss the point, boyo.

Doesn't quite cover the legs.. but have you seen this mod over at Skyrim Nexus?

http://skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1620

Maybe that'll help.

I'd like pants; a few male armors also suffer from this, most notably the Imperial armors. I understand that they're following the Roman tradition and I love it, but I can't help but think that any half-sane Roman soldier would have wanted to put some pants on in arctic temperatures.

I also haven't encoutered this piece of exuipment in my game yet. Would you please add a screenshot of it (as a link to prevent spoilers) so i may speak my mind about it?

It seems odd it doesnt contain pants.