Necromancy for Beginners

Technically speaking necromancy is a divination system that calls upon the knowledge of the dead. However it has evolved into a much larger system of magick that includes the summoning of spirits of the dead as well as the the psychopomps other wise known as the living embodiment of death itself to carry out the practitioners requests. Some of the psychopomps (conductor of souls in greek) include:
Jewish:
Gabriel
Azrael
Egypt:
Anubis
Hathor
Wepwawet
Voodoo:
Baron Samedi
Baron La Croix
Baron Cimitire
Manman Brigitte
Etruscan:
Culso
Norse:
The Valkyries
Freya
Lithuania:
Giltine
Greece:
Hecate
Hermes
Japan:
Jizo
German:
Mother Holle
Russian:
Baba Yaga
It has also come to include the usage of death energy, the energy that is present upon death, to those attuned to it there is a certain feeling upon the death of a person, animal or even plant and those sensitive to it would feel a sensation to a heavy object being lifted. This being said it is not necessary or even recommended that contact with a body be needed. There are as I will explain in further detail later, certain meditative methods that can be used to tap into this source.
Necromancy exists because the end of life doesn't necessarily end the need for one person to talk to another. Necromancy also exists because some metaphysical systems believe that dead souls are the only ones both privy to certain information and able to share that information in a lucid manner with the living.
Now the malevolent reputation of this practice can come into play in a few different ways, in some cultures, all human feelings and memory immediately cease to exist upon death, therefore there can be nothing benevolent about contacting the dead. There is also the concern about grave desecration and body desecration there are some that believe that the body is mearly a shell and that upon death it is of no consequence, but a certain amount of respect for the dead is needed to practice such an art with out reaping terrible consequences. So again this is not recommended if not for the fact that in most places this would be very illegal and would land some serious jail time as well as the fact that I cannot see Aunt Mable being very happy upon seeing her dug up corpse.
Taking and giving, this is standard practice for most low and high magickal practices concerning the dead and those who govern the dead. The theory to get something you must give something, from food to liquid such as wine, milk and honey, coffee and tea. For higher spirits it may be that you are required to prove your intentions are worthy of their intervention, of course even higher spirits have their favorite items and food that may be used to persuade them to your cause. I will cover summoning in a different post as there are quite a few different methods and some of them require time and preparation as well as indepth explanation of process.