Greek accent marks are used to indicate not only the syllabic emphasis of a word, but also its tonal inflection. The three accents are as follows:

The acute accent indicates a slight elevation of tone occurs at that syllable. The circumflex denotes a raising of pitch followed by a decent to the original level. The grave accent only occurs on the last syllable of a word, and does not so much indicate a drop in tonal pitch as a maintenance of the same quality throughout the word and leading into the next.

Greek words, as with any other language, are divided into one or more syllables. Accents can occur only on the final three syllables of a word which are named, from left to right: ultima ("last"), penult ("almost last"), and antepenult ("before the almost last"). Which accents can occur on which syllable are indicated on the chart below:

According to the two general rules of accenting noted in the above chart, certain accents may or may not appear on a syllable depending on its 'length' (i.e. the length of its vowel sound). Syllabel length can be determined by noting its position in the word and its voyellic contents, as indicated below:

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