Many interesting types of divination have been used down through history including onychomancy (fingernails), omphalomancy (navel), pessomancy (beans), alectryomancy (birds) and even the reading of entrails called hepatoscopy or anthropomancy.

One of the more useful types of divining in use now days is called “psychometry” or “token-object reading.”

The word “psychometry” came into being in 1842 by Joseph Rhodes Buchanan, a physician and professor at the Eclectic Medical Institute in Covington, Kentucky. Dr. Buchanan believed that all objects emanate or emit energy.

In 2009, after almost 170 years, the phrase “psychometry” was replaced by the term “token-object reading” because of the possible confusion with “psychometrics,” which is a branch of psychology.

Whatever one wants to call this particular type of ESP, it is the talent for gaining information about a person merely by scrying or touching his or her things or belongings.

Buchanan believed “The past is entombed in the present, the world is its own enduring monument; and that which is true of its physical is likewise true of its mental career.”

He believed that “objects recorded senses and emotions” that could be “played back” and that we would be able to learn about the history of mankind through these “mental fossils for psychologists.”

Buchanan performed experiments with medical students at the institute in which he discovered that some of the students reacted to an unmarked and unopened bottle of medicine exactly as they would have if they had ingested the medicine.

Sometimes these psychics or psychometrists are engaged by open-minded law enforcement officials to help solve crimes by attempting to hold objects that have been used in violent activities or that belonged to victims of vicious crimes. Many times the emanations being emitted are too horrible and intense for the psychic to even handle the object.

If the owner of an article has recently been very ill, the scryer might begin to exhibit similar symptoms while handling the item.

Evidently the psychic impressions can come in many different shapes and forms such as feelings, sounds, visual images, smells, and even tastes. Usually the impressions occur in quick succession, and not with any consistent sequence.

The psychometrist or scryer often reports becoming very tired and hot while they are working with the article.

This gift or talent is usually considered to be innate, and unable to be learned or developed.

References:
http://www.paralumun.com/psychometry.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Token-object_reading