Modern Greek has only five vowels in contrast to the seven of Classical Greek. In contrast to many languages the meaning of a word is dependent upon which syllable is stressed, which is denoted by the use of accents on a vowel.
If a word is pronounced with the incorrect syllable emphasized then the word will often be misunderstood by a native speaker. The word „[nómos]“ (νόμος = law) is only distinguishable from the word „[nomós]“ (νομός = district) by the syllable emphasis.
Modern Greek contains many words from other languages, like Turkish, Italian and French. In contrast to Classical Greek, forming new words from combinations of other words is easy.