But I have a soft spot for emeralds and star sapphires.
My wife likes rubies. I've told here on many occasions that I will buy her all the rubies she likes, but if she wants a diamond, she can buy it herself because I will not support De Beers' world-wide monopoly.
De Beers doesn't have a world-wide monopoly. There are competitors. The Israelis, Indians, and Russians are happy to go along for the ride. We even have a couple of diamond mine in the US that are public areas where people can go mine for themselves. Someone just found a seven or so carat F color, pretty clear diamond from which they think they can cut a four to five carat very nice gem grade diamond. . . and the kid who found it gets to keep it! It was just sitting on the ground.
There are synthetic rubies which are inexpensive. . . and emeralds also. But quality naturals of both are VERY expensive. I have several natural star rubies that have beautiful stars and have the very desired "pigeon blood" color. One 6.5 carat I picked up on eBay on an auction which was miscategorized and I wound up as the only bidder. Something like that as a loose stone I expected to go for around $750. . . but I wound up getting it for the $25 opening bid. it was not listed in Gems, or even jewelry, so no one else found it. I had it made into a beautiful ring for my lady. Another I have is in a man's natural gold nugget ring. That one is about 3.5 carats. Both have beautiful stars.
Way back, when I was managing a gun shop in Sacramento, a young man who had just gotten a security guard job came in needing to buy a gun for work. He didn't have the money to buy it, but he did have a gold nugget ring with a raw emerald mounted in it. He said he'd spent a summer working as a miner in South America and he had found the stone and had it mounted in the gold nugget and made into a ring. He offered to trade the ring for the gun. The owner of the shop told me to have the ring appraised. I took it to a jeweler I knew who offered me $8,000 for it on the spot. He said he though he could get a 5 carat flawless emerald out of what he said was a 10 carat natural raw emerald. The boss decided he didn't want to have anything to do with the transaction and told me to give the ring back to the customer. I was young and stupid back then. I should have bought the gun and done the trade myself. DUH! But, I don't know if I could have lived with myself if I had done that. Instead, I told him to go talk to the jeweler. He came back later and paid cash for the gun.