Part I of this book clarifies what culture can mean, sorting out its conceptual history so as to bring some sense into the extraordinary conceptual confusion. Here, numerous applications, uses and critical discussions of the concept are thematised, in research as well as in public debate. First, this chapter presents the historically most ancient "ontological" definition that links culture to cult and cultivation. Its gradual development is traced, and it is also shown how it remains in use today, though some of its aspects seem increasingly problematic, not least its reliance on a rather stiff binary division between nature and culture.