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The interpretation of the pulpit's complex iconographic programme, probably at least partly devised by the Dominicans of Santa Caterina, Pisa, is controversial, and many of the symbols and allegories of the pulpit bear more than one level of sometimes conflicting meaning; the female (known as the Mater) figure of the base, for example, has been successively interpreted as Pisa, Eve, Jerusalem, Ecclesia, Mary, Charity, and Mother Earth.
The outer supports consist of columns standing on low plinths or lions, or of full-length figures: the Mater, her pedestal surrounded by the Four Cardinal Virtues (the Prudence figure is based on an Antique Venus Pudica).
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