IX. The peculiar darkness of the _choir_ has already been mentioned. It results mainly (as will be seen from the Plan) from the arrangement of the transepts, which prevents the admission of light to the choir except from its clerestory.
The choir and sacrarium, as at present formed, consist of only three bays, eastward of the screen. (The Norman choir extended no doubt to the western arch of the tower, if not into the first bay of the nave.) As far as the top of the triforium, the choir is _Norman_: the clerestory and vaulting are _Early English_, and date, apparently, from the middle of the thirteenth century. No record of their construction has been preserved.
The _main arches_ of the choir are of three orders, and spring from massive composite piers, with broad, square bases. The capitals of the semi-detached shafts are enriched with leafage and grotesque heads. The _triforium_, in each bay, consists of one wide Norman arch circumscribing two smaller, divided by a central shaft, and springing on either side from two massive semicircular piers, with small capitals. Both outer and inner arches spring from these piers. The capitals of the central shafts have square abaci, and are enriched. The tympana of the outer arches are covered with scallop, leaf, and billet-ornament. At the base of the triforium runs a square stringcourse, enriched with minute carving. The lozenge ornament prevails round the main arches of the choir, as does the zigzag round those of the nave.
Broad square pilasters, with semi-detached shafts at their angles, fill the spaces between the piers. They terminate at the spring of the triforium arches in double triangular headings, with crocheted sides, and finials of leafage. These headings are Early English, of the same date as the clerestory and vaulting; and between each pair rises a group of so-called vaulting-shafts, with capitals of leafage, terminating at the base of the clerestory; and connected (under the actual base of the clerestory) by a band of open flowers. The _clerestory_ consists of one lofty pointed arch in each bay, divided by a central shaft; on either side is a smaller trefoiled arch. The windows, of two lights, with a quatrefoil in the heading, are placed at the back of the wall-passage, and form in effect a double plane with the large inner arches. They are filled on each side with indifferent stained glass. The choir _vaulting_ is plain quadripartite, with bosses of leafage at the intersections.