 Built out of earth and around fifty local sarsen megaliths , the long barrow consisted of a sub @-@ rectangular earthen tumulus enclosed by kerb @-@ stones . Within the eastern end of the tumulus was a stone chamber , into which human remains were deposited on at least two separate occasions during the Early Neolithic . <unk> analysis of these remains has shown them to be those of at least seventeen individuals , a mixture of men , women , children and adults . At least one of the bodies had been <unk> prior to burial , potentially reflecting a funerary tradition of <unk> and secondary burial . As with other barrows , Coldrum has been interpreted as a tomb to house the remains of the dead , perhaps as part of a belief system involving ancestor veneration , although archaeologists have suggested that it may also have had further religious , ritual , and cultural connotations and uses . 
