Welcome to the highest part of Colle di Val d’Elsa and the building which rises majestically over the rest of the town: the city’s Co-cathedral, where the bishop, shepherd and guide of God’s people, has his cathedra, or throne, from which, as the successor to the apostles, he continues to proclaim the teaching of Jesus Christ. The church is dedicated to Saints Albert, Martial, Faustinus and Jovita. Martial was the founder of the local Christian community, because, tradition tells us, he celebrated the first baptisms in the Elsa river. Faustinus and Jovita were two second-century martyrs who, during the persecutions of the Christians in Rome, took refuge on the Piticciano hill, where the ancient baptismal church called the Pieve a Elsa, no longer extant, was dedicated to them. Very early on, the Christian community of Colle di Val d’Elsa, led by an archpriest, broke free of the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Volterra, depending directly on the Pope, until in 1592 it was erected as a diocese. In 1986 the diocese was absorbed into the Archdiocese of Siena-Colle di Val d’Elsa-Montalcino, leaving to the basilica the function of Co-cathedral. The basilica is the seat of identity of the people of Colle, who venerate here the Holy Nail which, according to tradition, pierced the left foot of Christ on the Cross. Devotion to this holy relic is linked in particular with the . . .