In early modern Italy, the unglazed terracotta sculptures made between c. 1400 and 1535 in the regions historically, if inconsistently, identified as 'Lombardy' are unparalleled within the peninsula for both their technical complexity and their naturalistic depictions of extreme human emotion. My dissertation places clay the core of its investigation to offer the first overarching and geographically comprehensive account of this ambitious and remarkable form of sculpture. I examine the medium’s technical and aesthetic affordances to discuss this corpus of objects, their makers, and these works’ reception within broader artisanal, social, and intellectual histories.