[a. F. culture (in OF. couture), ad. L. cultūra cultivation, tending, in Christian authors, worship, f. ppl. stem of colĕre: see CULT.]
† 1. Worship; reverential homage. Obs. rare.
1483. Caxton, Gold. Leg., 81/1. Whan they departe fro the culture and honour of theyr god.
2. The action or practice of cultivating the soil; tillage, husbandry: = CULTIVATION 1.
c. 1420. Pallad. on Husb., I. 21. In places there thou wilt have the culture.
1613. R. C., Table Alph. (ed. 3), Culture, husbandry, tilling.
1665–9. Boyle, Occas. Refl. (1675), 320. Such a … plot of his Eden … gratefully crowns his Culture … with chaplets of Flowers.
1707. Curios. in Husb. & Gard., 3. Man was … imploy’d in the Culture of the Garden.
1806. Gazetteer Scot. (ed. 3), 296. The soil is clay, and difficult of culture.
1866. Rogers, Agric. & Prices, I. 11. The same kinds of grain … are sown … and the same mode of culture is adopted.
b. Cultivated condition. Obs.
1538. Starkey, England, I. i. 12. The erth … by the dylygent labur and pollycy of man ys brought to maruelous culture and fortylite.
† c. concr. A piece of tilled land; a cultivated field. Obs.
1557. MS. Indenture 30 June, [Conveying] a culture of land called the flatte, in Brantingham, Yks.
1560. Whitehorne, Arte of Warre (1573), 27 b. Euery culture where bee Vines and other trees lettes the horses.
1757. Dyer, Fleece, IV. (1761), 176 (R.). From their tenements, Pleas’d and refresh’d, proceeds the caravan Thro’ lively-spreading cultures, pastures green.
3. The cultivating or rearing of a plant or crop; = CULTIVATION 2.
1626. Bacon, Sylva, § 402. These … were slower than the ordinary Wheat … and this Culture did rather retard than advance.
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., I. 78. The Culture suiting to the sev’ral kinds Of Seeds and Plants.
1750. Johnson, Rambler, No. 33, ¶ 2. The fruits, which without culture fell ripe into their hands.
1856. Emerson, Eng. Traits, Ability, Wks. (Bohn), II. 42. [England] is too far north for the culture of the vine.
1887. Pall Mall Gaz., 15 Oct., 11/2. There are eighty acres devoted to bulb culture.
b. transf. The rearing or raising of certain animals, such as fish, oysters, bees, etc., or of natural products such as silk.
1796. Morse, Amer. Geog., I. 679. The culture of silk.
1862. Cornh. Mag., V. 201. The dredgers at Whitstable have so far adopted oyster culture.
1886. T. B. Blow, in Pall Mall Gaz., 23 Sept., 6/2. In the interests of bee-culture, and in the search of improved races of bees.
c. The artificial development of microscopic organisms, esp. bacteria, in specially prepared media; concr. the product of such culture; a growth or crop of artificially developed bacteria, etc. Also in Comb., as culture-fluid, -tube, etc.
1884. E. Klein, Micro-Organisms & Disease (1886), 94. When cultures of this bacterium are kept for some time…, their virulence becomes diminished. Ibid., 39. A series of new culture-tubes. Ibid., A culture-fluid … that contains … various species of organisms.
† d. The training of the human body. Obs.
1628. Hobbes, Thucyd., I. (1629), 5. Amongst whom [the Lacedæmonians] … especially in the culture of their bodies, the Nobility obserued the most equality with the Commons.
1793. Beddoes, Lett. Darwin, 60. To suppose the organization of man equally susceptible of improvement from culture with that of various animals and vegetables.
4. fig. The cultivating or development (of the mind, faculties, manners, etc.); improvement or refinement by education and training.
c. 1510. More, Picus, Wks. 14. To the culture and profit of theyr myndes.
a. 1633. Lennard, trans. Charron’s Wisd. (1658), 174. Necessary for the culture of good manners.
1651. Hobbes, Leviath., II. xxxi. 189. The education of Children [is called] a Culture of their mindes.
1752. Johnson, Rambler, No. 189, ¶ 12. She … neglected the culture of [her] understanding.
1848. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., II. 55. The precise point to which intellectual culture can be carried.
1865. R. W. Dale, Jewish Temp., xiv. (1877), 155. The Jewish system was intended for the culture of the religious life of the Jews themselves.
5. absol. The training, development and refinement of mind, tastes and manners; the condition of being thus trained and refined; the intellectual side of civilization.
1805. Wordsw., Prelude, XIII. 197. Where grace Of culture hath been utterly unknown.
1860. Motley, Netherl. (1868), I. ii. 47. His culture was not extensive.
1876. M. Arnold, Lit. & Dogma, xiii. Culture, the acquainting ourselves with the best that has been known and said in the world.
1889. Jessopp, Coming of Friars, iii. 131. Some few of the larger … monasteries … [were] centres of culture.
Mod. A man of considerable culture.
b. (with a and pl.) A particular form or type of intellectual development.
1867. Freeman, Norm. Conq. (1876), I. iv. 150. A language and culture which was wholly alien to them.
1891. Spectator, 27 June, 888/2. Speaking all languages, knowing all cultures, living amongst all races.
6. The prosecution with special attention or study of any subject or pursuit; = CULTIVATION 3. (rare.)
1876. Bancroft, Hist. U.S., I. Introd. 1. Our national resources are developed by an earnest culture of the arts of peace.
