The term firmamentum came to Spanish as firmament . It is a concept that alludes to the celestial vault : the apparent sphere that surrounds the surface of our planet .
Firmament, celestial vault and even sky are notions that can be used synonymously in certain contexts. In general, we speak of the firmament with respect to the place where the stars and the rest of the stars or celestial bodies are apparently located .
The origin of the idea of the firmament is found in ancient times, when it was believed that the stars were fixed or firm in the celestial vault. Claudius Ptolemy (100-170), Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) and Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) are some of the scientists who developed their theories based on this belief of firm stars in the sky.
The British Edmund Halley (1656-1742) was the one who, in the 18th century , demonstrated that the stars were not fixed in the celestial sphere. In any case, the concept of firmament continued to be used to this day.
Nowadays, firmament is usually used to refer to the infinite space in which the different stars move . Observed from Earth , the sky appears hemispherical.
It is important to remember that not even the many technological advances we have today are enough to reach the most remote corners of the universe ; On the contrary, solid knowledge about reality outside our planet is scarce, since the rest is a set of theories that have not yet been proven.
In this way, if we go back in time a few centuries, when human beings did not have an arsenal of scientific tools and concepts like those they have today, it is logical that they would have come to think that the stars were fixed in the sky. . Regardless of the differences, this idea has been reflected more than once in fiction stories, with the intention of generating a touch of humor by telling the reader that one of the characters sees the cosmos in this very reduced way.
Claudius Ptolemy was the author of the geocentric theory , according to which our planet is located at the very center of the universe and all the stars revolve around it, including the Sun. This is an observation made almost two millennia ago, when people spoke of the sphere of the fixed stars , a "shell" that represented the edge of the universe.
At that time the stars were considered fixed because they did not appear to move relative to each other when observed at night. The only exception was the Sun, which was seen moving throughout the day and when the first stars appeared. It all arose when astronomy and philosophy scholars grouped the celestial lights into two: on the one hand, they located those that supposedly rose and set without altering their disposition over time ; In the other group they included what they called wandering stars .
In the latter were the five planets that can be seen without the help of a telescope (Mercury, Mars, Saturn, Venus and Jupiter) and also the Sun and the Moon. It is curious that in the long path that took human beings from the notion of the firmament to the knowledge they have today, they have confused planets with stars and satellites on more than one occasion.
In colloquial language, the group of celebrities (that is, stars) of a certain area is known as the firmament. Accessing the firmament, in this sense, means reaching fame (stardom). For example: “With this new title, the player definitively entered the firmament of national sports” , “The firmament of actors and actresses once again showed their solidarity at the traditional charity dinner that is held every year” , “No I am interested in being part of the firmament: I sing because it gives me pleasure.”