Origin and history of spherical

a re-Latinized spelling, attested beginning mid-15c., of Middle English spere (c. 1300) "cosmos; space, conceived as a hollow globe about the world," from Anglo-French espiere, Old French espere (13c., Modern French sphère), from Latin sphaera "globe, ball, celestial sphere" (Medieval Latin spera), from Greek sphaira "globe, ball, playing ball, terrestrial globe," a word of unknown origin.

According to Beekes there are no certain cognates outside Greek, but the Greek word also has been borrowed into Syrian (espero), Ethiopian (spir), Armenian (sp'er), and (non-Indo-European) Georgian (spero).

From late 14c. in reference to any of the supposed concentric, transparent, hollow, crystalline globes of the cosmos believed to revolve around the earth and contain the planets and the fixed stars; the supposed harmonious sound they made rubbing against one another was the music of the spheres (late 14c.), Milton's sphery chime.

Also from late 14c. in the general sense of "a globe; object of spherical form, a ball," and in the geometric sense of "solid figure with all points equidistant from the center." The meaning "range of something, place or scene" of activity, knowledge, etc. is recorded c. 1600 (as in sphere of influence, 1885, originally in reference to Anglo-German colonial rivalry in Africa).

compound adjectival word-forming element, usually interchangeable with -ic but sometimes with specialized sense (such as historic/historical, politic/political), Middle English, from Late Latin -icalis, from Latin -icus + -alis (see -al (1)). Probably it was needed because the forms in -ic often took on a noun sense (for example physic). Forms in -ical tend to be attested earlier in English than their twins in -ic.