The large wall fresco depicts Pietro Pomponazzi, a professor of the university (on the left), Agostino Nifo (centre), and Cardinàl Gaspare Contarìni (seen from behind).

This is the room dedicated to literature and philosophy, and like the Sala di Medicìna on the floor below, was part of the aristocratic dwelling incorporated into the Hospitium Bovis in the early fifteenth century and Palazzo del Bo a century later.

A fresco by Bruno Saètti, entitled Dispute on the Immortality of the Soul, was added to the original wooden ceiling and the fourteenth-century wall frieze in 1941–2. The reason for the addition was that in the early 1500s the three protagonists of the fresco were involved in an erudite argument on the subject.

Pomponazzi, who believed in the mortality of the soul, was defended by the University of Padua, always at the forefront of guaranteeing intellectual freedom to students and professors.

The men commemorated with plaques, coats of arms and portraits on the other walls – Torquato Tasso, Niccolò Tommasèo, Pietro Bembo, and many others – were also given this protection.