This work aims to trace in history the elements that defined criminal cultures. (…) It focuses on the historical study of the conformation of the categories of criminal prosecution and, essentially, its link with the very characters, objectives and political justifications of criminal law and punishment. Thus, the well-known categories of "inquisitive" and "accusatory" do not refer only to prosecution systems, but correspond originally to two different ways of understanding punishment and exercising power. Thus, the defining elements of what we can call “cultures” are determined: the culture of authority and the culture of equality; that of the public and that of the private, that of concentrated power and that of diffuse power. It is not necessary to highlight the relationship between power and the penal system. Since this work does not intend but to initiate a discussion about the way in which traditions have forged our culture in criminal matters and, perhaps, to warn of the historical origin of our approaches to crime, punishment, the truth and the criminal process. In summary, it is based on the hypothesis that under the names of adversarial and inquisitive different criminal cultures are hidden, which recognize different historical roots; Judeo-Christian one, pagan the other.