Convicted

The perfect octahedron mistaken for ruby for a thousand years — settled in what it is.

Spinel · The Law of Priority

Family: Magnesium aluminium oxide
Hardness: 8 on the Mohs scale
Colour: Hot pink to red, grown as natural octahedrons
Signature: The Black Prince's Ruby in the British crown is a spinel

The stone read as the word

For centuries the greatest 'rubies' in Europe's crowns were spinels; nobody could tell until modern gemmology. Spinel never argued — it simply kept growing its own flawless eight-sided form.

Conviction comes from convincere, to be fully proven. It is not volume. It is a stone that was right the whole time.

What it is carried for

Carried when she is right and the room has not caught up.
Held for a settled position that no longer needs defending.