Seance spell / Speak With Dead sans corpse

[ffone]

Is there a way to 'speak with the dead' when there is no corpse (say, disintegrated or nothing at all) suitable for Speak With Dead?

Like a new age-y seance - speaking to or channeling the soul of someone long dead, possibly a historical figure or ancestor. There's certainly precedent in folklore/mysticism, so I figured there'd be some DnD way.

If not, any suggests on on a suitable approximation? Contact Other Plane (their soul probably now exists on some outer plane) etc?

[Curmudgeon]

The Persuade to Manifest spell (Ghostwalk, page 56) could work on any soul "that has died and not yet manifested on the Material Plane or passed on to the True Afterlife." Whether the soul has passed on is up to your DM, but the spell has a good chance of working on the recently deceased. Note you may have to visit the Ethereal Plane if the target can't make their manifest checks to reach the Material Plane.

[Zaq]

There's the feat Spirit Sense in Heroes of Horror that lets you see and talk to the spirits of the recently dead (body not required), but that very explicitly deals with the recently dead and not your long-departed ancestors. (It's still a cool feat, and I swear I'll take it some day.)

[Grendus]

Honestly? I'd homebrew it up. Make it require an item of importance to the deceased, either a part of their body or an item that identifies them (a shirt from their closet wouldn't be good enough, but their favorite tunic or the sword they always carried into battle would) and at least three people. Same spell level as Speak With Dead, and like SWD it would allow one question per 2 caster levels and per ritual member, whichever is lower. So if you're 12th level and want to ask 6 questions, you need six people to join hands with you and perform the ritual.

Speak With Dead would be easier to pull off if you have the whole corpse, but Seance would be possible if the corpse was missing or destroyed. But that's just me, maybe make it one spell level higher to balance it out.