Sphere

How to spell sphere

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce sphere

What does sphere mean?

1. nounA perfectly round three-dimensional object, like a ball, where every point on the surface is the same distance from the centre.
2. nounA particular area of activity, knowledge, or influence in which a person or group operates.

Sphere in a sentence

• The artist sculpted a smooth marble sphere for the fountain.

• Hiring decisions fall outside her sphere of responsibility.

• A basketball is the most familiar example of a sphere.

• The company expanded its sphere of influence into overseas markets.

Where does sphere come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word traces back to the Greek sphaira, which literally meant a ball, a globe, or any round body, and was the word the Greeks used for the playing ball as well as for the heavenly orbs. It passed into Latin as sphaera, keeping the sense of a perfectly round object, and medieval astronomers used it for the imagined transparent shells that were thought to carry the sun, moon, and planets around the Earth. English took it up in the 1300s by way of Old French espere, and the older spelling reflected that French route before scholars restored the more classical spher- form. From the literal round body grew the familiar figurative use, a person's 'sphere' of activity or influence, which echoes those old astronomical regions of the heavens. The trap in spelling lies in that opening 'sph' cluster and the silent final 'e', both inherited straight from the Greek and Latin roots.

How the word is built

• spher- (from Greek sphaira: a ball or globe)
• silent -e