According to some rumors, it is thought that the first "oratory" present on the site where the shrine stands today was built as early as 1161. When St. Charles arrived on a pastoral visit in 1579 he found the building of the first church of St. Valeria in a pitiful condition, he therefore ordered a part of the portico to be torn down and a sacristy to be built on the remaining part to house the church furnishings. Not performed the work Cardinal Federico Borromeo reiterated the order, however again to no avail, accomplices being the advent of famine and then plague in 1630.
Only in the middle of the century was the old building demolished to build a more worthy temple, after which construction of a new sanctuary was begun, which was inaugurated three years later in 1653. Later in 1839 the interior of the church was embellished with two frescoes by Luigi Sabatelli.
The bell tower, visible from a great distance and equipped with three bells, was added in 1881; in 1932 the old little church was torn down and the shrine as we see it today was begun: a Latin cross with three naves, with a total area of about a thousand square meters. On the high altar, in a gilded wooden triptych, is the original image of the Virgin.
The Shrine is one of the stops on the Saint Augustine's Way.
