The figures are in classical attire of toga and sandals, gathered under a tree, against a backdrop of allusive elements, including stone columns suggestive of the grand civic architecture of the age, and glimpses of distant cliffs or havens, perhaps metaphysical in nature.

[4][3] Otto Brendel published in 1936 a book-length study arguing that the scene should be interpreted by focusing on the sphere seen as central for the mosaic.

Mattusch (2008) suggests for the other figures, the Greek philosophers and scholars: Thales, Anaxagoras, Pythagoras, Xenophanes, Democritus, Eudoxus, Euctemon, Callippus, Meton, Philippus, Hipparchus, and Aratus.

[7] David Sedley identifies the figures as Timaeus, Eudoxus, Plato, Xenocrates, Archytas, Speusippus and Aristotle.

[3] A strikingly similar mosaic has been found in Sarsina (now at Villa Albani) and as it has been dated after the volcanic eruption at Pompeii, a common source has been reasonably conjectured.