In all eukaryotes chromatin physically restricts the accessibility of the genome to regulatory proteins such as transcription factors. Plant model systems have been instrumental in demonstrating that this restriction is dynamic and changes during development and in response to exogenous cues. Among the multiple epigenetic mechanisms that alter chromatin to regulate gene expression, histone modifications play a major role. Recent studies in Arabidopsis have provided the first genome-wide histone modification maps, revealed important biological roles for histone modifications, and advanced our understanding of stimulus-dependent changes in histone modifications.