πάντες ἄνθρωποι τοῦ εἰδέναι ὀρέγονται φύσει. σημεῖον δ᾽ ἡ τῶν αἰσθήσεων ἀγάπησις: καὶ γὰρ χωρὶς τῆς χρείας ἀγαπῶνται δι᾽ αὑτάς, καὶ μάλιστα τῶν ἄλλων ἡ διὰ τῶν ὀμμάτων. οὐ γὰρ μόνον ἵνα πράττωμεν ἀλλὰ καὶ μηθὲν μέλλοντες πράττειν τὸ ὁρᾶν αἱρούμεθα ἀντὶ πάντων ὡς εἰπεῖν τῶν ἄλλων. αἴτιον δ᾽ ὅτι μάλιστα ποιεῖ γνωρίζειν ἡμᾶς αὕτη τῶν αἰσθήσεων καὶ πολλὰς δηλοῖ διαφοράς. φύσει μὲν οὖν αἴσθησιν ἔχοντα γίγνεται τὰ ζῷα, ἐκ δὲ ταύτης τοῖς μὲν αὐτῶν οὐκ ἐγγίγνεται μνήμη, τοῖς δ᾽ ἐγγίγνεται.

That's the first lines from Aristotle's Metaphysics. You may look at that and ask, "What the fuck are all those accent marks everywhere? I didn't know Greek had that shit." Yep, it did. Back during the Hellenistic period after Alexander conquered Persia, ancient Greeks realized people who weren't from Greece didn't know where the tones would go and whether they'd rise or fall, so they incorporated them into the writing. However by the Byzantine period a few hundred years later no one was saying them anymore, and nowadays it's pretty much dead. However as an ancient Greek student you're required to learn these arcane rules for where each accent goes and which one it is even though we don't actually know how they were pronounced exactly. I have my gripes for each language — kunyomi/onyomi for Japanese, inconsistent spelling in Old English, French slurring their way through speaking, I still have the vaguest idea of where 了 goes in a sentence in Mandarin — but this one really got to me because it didn't really help me with anything in the end. Why do we insist on continuing to use it?