Loin Cloth

For some heroes, this is all the armor they need.

"Also, everyone here could use a little less loin and a lot more cloth."

—Belkar Bitterleaf, The Order of the Stick, #736

In essence, a Loin Cloth is lower body underwear made of cloth or hides. Sometimes it's just a flap over the crotch and rear, and sometimes it's woven like actual briefs. It's considered one of the first, if not the first, items of clothing worn by humans.

Often some cultures, especially stereotypically primitive ones, have this as the only form of clothing. But one of the most prominent appearances in fiction is the fantasy Barbarian Heroes, even though they come from the north, where it's really cold. Sure they wear these made of fur, and perhaps they dress better when actually in their northern homelands, but otherwise this is a form of Impossibly Cool Clothes. Is frequently used as a male instance of Stripperific outfits.

May occasionally be justified, if the barbarian from the Grim Up North actually complains about the sweltering heat of the southern lands he's exploring, and refuses to wear more for this reason.

Quite often overlaps with a (Walking) Shirtless Scene. Sometimes the wearer Does Not Like Shoes. Also can be worn by women, either with or without a matching bikini top.

A Super-Trope to Fundoshi.

Compare Fur Bikini.

Examples of Loin Cloth include:

Advertising

Both the guy and the girl in this commercial for Coty Wild Musk are wearing loin cloths.

Anime and Manga

Vision of Escaflowne: While his is a kilt and not a loincloth, otherwise movie version of Van Fanel pretty much nailed it. He's enough of a barbarian, and hardly wears anything else for the whole movie.
Asu no Yoichi: Yoichi in his show's requisite Beach Episode.
Ouran High School Host Club's Suou Tamaki has to wear a loincloth in the manga after losing a bet to Kyouya. He's a little upset about it at first, but then easily forgets about it after Haruhi gives him a super bouncy ball to play with (so he would stop being a pain).
Bleach: Ikkaku wears one in the "Bleach on the Beach" chapter.
Lucky Star: Konata compares the experience of eating beachhouse food to running around the beach in a loincloth. (This itself is a reference to Mister Ajikko.)
Minami-ke features recurring newscasts about a "loincloth festival" as a Running Gag.
Ninku: Toji often wears a loincloth.
Fullmetal Alchemist: Father in his final form has a loincloth which use to be part of his robe.
Wild Rock is set in One Million BC and has all the men running around in loincloths and little more.
In an episode of the latest Cyborg 009 series, 007 gets his clothes torn when he uses his powers to expand his body to huge proportions and wears this. (Notice that in the original manga, he was naked.)

Film

Spartacus. In the opening fight that triggers the revolt, the upper-class Roman women for whom the spectacle has been put on order that both gladiators fight in loin cloths.
Jack from Legend—he starts the movie as a solitary woods-dweller wearing little but a loin cloth. After he becomes officially The Chosen One, however, he gets a sword, shield, and suit of armor... which covers his chest and arms, but does nothing to obscure his loinclothed lower body. It's a wonder Darkness never just aimed a little bit lower...
The Na'vi in Avatar all wear loincloths.
George of the Jungle the titular character, who serves as Mr. Fanservice.

Literature

Most visual adaptations of Conan the Barbarian. Howard's original short stories (and most Conan stories by later authors) are better about dressing Conan in clothing appropriate to his current situation (e.g., in chain armour as a mercenary captain or professional soldier; in leather armour as a brigand leader; shirtless but in breeches as a thief; loincloth when a slave or tropical pirate).
Also Cohen the Barbarian from Discworld, who is a pastiche of Conan as an octogenarian.
Guin is only wearing this when he first appears, though he wears armor when he has the chance.
Tarzan is often depicted this way, but just as often his hides make a wraparound outfit.
Illustrated editions of The Jungle Book and other Wild Child stories sometimes depict their protagonists this way if only to avoid showing them naked.
Mau, in Nation, whose people refer to Westerners as "the trousermen".
In The Krytos Trap, Proud Warrior Race Twi'leks are said to wear an outfit that consists of a loincloth, wrapped leggings to the knee, Fingerless Gloves, and a decorative/functional bandoleer, all under a cloak. Wedge Antilles, visiting to try and coax them into selling the New Republic some medicine, puts on a modified version that includes an emerald green loincloth over his trousers. He wants his garb to signal that he's a warrior and not a merchant, but he's also not a Proud Warrior Race Twi'lek.

Live-Action TV

In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Rom and his fiancée were looking at wedding dresses, and one was nothing but a loincloth. His Ferengi nature felt that was a good compromise, but it got rejected.
The most common costume in Spartacus: Blood and Sand. At least when they're not wrestling naked.
The Feathered Serpent, a British young adult show from the 1970s set in Aztec Mexico, sometimes has fit young men just wearing loincloths. The handsome Prince Heumac has a couple of loincloth scenes. In one of them he's accompanied by his servant Tozo (who's more conservatively dressed) , while in the other he's engaged in ritual combat with another guy in a loincloth.

Music

Ted Nugent often wore a loincloth as part of his "wild man" persona.
Vocaloid: Gackupo and Kaito wear them in the song "Dancing Samurai", as well as some other videos.

Tabletop Games

The cover of the board game Hero Quest (pictured above).

Video Games

Maeda Toshiie from Sengoku Basara wears nothing but a loincloth and a few belts, making him a certified Hot Dad.
Tekken 4. Heihachi. Squick.
Rock, a berserker from Soul Calibur wears this as part of his default outfit.
This is the result after Bang Shishigami uses his astral heat in continuum shift. He's even got an achievement called "Loincloth Festival".
Alan (The Brave One) from Magic Sword wears one and little else, being a Barbarian Hero.
Goro and Kintaro in Mortal Kombat both have briefs, with a flap in front added in later games to show off the cloth physics.
The PCs in Dragon Age: Origins are wearing this under their clothes, if you decide to let them wear clothes. They don't take them off during the sex scenes, however.
- There's one especially erotic-looking scene where Alistair and The Warden get thrown into a dungeon cell wearing nothing but their underwear. The heavy Chiaroscuro from the torchlight in the dungeon makes it rather difficult to forget everyone's naked.
In Dragon Quest III, the female soldier's Chainmail Bikini outfit has a loincloth piece.
- Dragon Quest IV: Manya's outfit has a loincloth strip.
In Dark Souls, the player wears this under all their armor.

Web Comics

In The Order of the Stick, loincloths are standard-issue for gladiator convicts in the Empire of Blood—even for Lizard Folk, although they don't need them.
In Goblins, Minmax the Unstoppable Warrior doesn't like pants. Also Thaco, who's wearing a loincloth until the younger goblins insist he tries out some halfling clothes, because of his tendency to flash them in the wind or when doing a hand-stand.
Gorgado in Fite! wears one. Guz also wears one under his armor, and spends a while in nothing but it after he loses said armor.

Western Animation

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe: He-Man in both the original and remake.
Thundarr the Barbarian
Galtar and the Golden Lance
The Simpsons: Mr. Burns and his Grizzly Bear Underwear.
'Mike, Lu & Og: Og
This is the standard attire for Gargoyles, both male and female.
Wild Smurf in The Smurfs. In the comic books, Wild only wore leaves until Tailor made him a loincloth.

Real Life

Eugen Sandow, a German body-building pioneer and professional strongman. Sandow was also a major source of inspiration for Tarzan.
Standard male attire for many North American Indian societies. Crazy Horse wore nothing but this, in keeping with his vision.
Standard male attire in many tribal societies worldwide, especially in warm climates.
Gandhi wore a loincloth to symbolize solidarity with the Indian working class.

There was an old fellow named Gandhi
Who went in the bar for a brandy.
With his grest loincloth
He wiped off the froth
And the barman said, "Blimey, that's handy!"

—Spike Milligan

In Japan, the fundoshi loincloth is worn by both men and women to the Hadaka Matsuri and Kanamara Matsui festivals. (NSFW).