When this part of today’s old town centre used to be the ‘Burgus’, meaning scarcely inhabited countryside, close to the beach and outside the town walls, there was a church here, devoted to the Twelve Apostles. Its name was changed to San Siro during the 6th century, in honour of a venerable 4th-century Bishop of Genoa. San Siro was the city’s first cathedral. According to tradition, this Saint is connected to the miracle of the basilisk, a monster representing the plague or perhaps the Arian heresy. Apparently, he hunted the beast out of its hiding place at the bottom of a well and slew it. This episode is evoked in a medieval bas relief in a portico opposite the south side of the church and by a fresco inside the apse. Nowadays, this church houses some very important works of art, including frescoes, paintings and statues in the most refined 17th-century Genoese Baroque style. Among these is the black marble and bronze high altar, a 17th-century masterpiece by Pierre Puget. Freedom fighter Giuseppe Mazzini, whose family lived close by, was baptised in this church on the 23rd of June 1805. The current neo-classical façade was designed by architect Carlo Barabino in 1820. Other churches have also been devoted to the holy bishop Saint Syrus, such as San Siro di Struppa in the Bisagno Valley, where the saint was born. San Siro di Struppa is a beautiful Romanesque church built on the boundary between the city and the countryside.