Memory/empathy chair?

[golddust]

Looking for the name of a novel I read at least 20 years ago. Plot points I (think) I remember:
Female investigator or scientist comes to planet whose inhabitants have perhaps forgotten that they are descendants of colonists. She doesn't tell them she's from offworld. Metal is rare or scarce (she has a thin metal bracelet that is considered an extravagant luxury). It is a low tech society (characters travel by horse) with the exception of chair type devices that impart/transfer the recorded memories and thoughts of people that are dead. Possibly a leftover from the original settlers? At some point the protagonist is commanded to use one of these "memory" seats and she is very fearful beforehand because something similar is used offworld for interrogation/coercion/torture.
If this sounds familiar to anyone, please lead me in the right direction. I have been wracking my brain for weeks! LOL. Thanks!

 

[Montero]

With regard to forgetting they are descendants of colonists - darn - I have some like that on my shelf but can't immediately spot them. Female author, possibly a Katherine? (Not Kurtz or Kerr).

The one I am thinking of - due to oddities of time space, its been thousands of years for the colonists and a lot less for the "outside world".
There are psi powers - some areas have it a lot more than others.
The ship's astrogator was called something like Camilla and she becomes revered to the colonists as semi-goddess, known as the mother of the race.
They have evolved a medieval type society, with various wrinkles.

The outside world has a space port on the planet and relations are not exactly good and there is cultural clash.

 

[Montero]

The one I am thinking of is the Darkover series by Marion Zimmer Bradley (so much for Katherine....)

 

[golddust]

The one I am thinking of is the Darkover series by Marion Zimmer Bradley (so much for Katherine....)

Thank you much for the suggestion! I just read plot descriptions for a number of the Darkover novels and none of them sound familiar, unfortunately. It's possible I'm recalling plot points from more than one novel and conflating them. I was in my teens when I read the story I'm looking for (and that was QUITE a few years ago!)
There was a scene that stuck in my mind that's hazy on specifics but clear on emotional impact. It's when the off-world visitor (scientist?) is brought before some religious order for examination or trial (heresy maybe). The questioners are going to use one of the memory/empathy devices on her and she freaks out because these devices are used off-world by some bad guys and she knows that horrible damage can be done to the mind. Madness, memory loss, brainwashing. But all the priests do is give her the memories of (I think) one of the original colonists.
Ah well...the search continues. But thanks!