Who first called a spade "a spade"?

Search: call a spade a spade origin

Why: It's easiest to deal with crappy crap if you're honest with yourself about the situation and what it means.

Answer: The Greeks!

The exact origin is uncertain; the playwright Menander, in a fragment, said "I call a fig a fig, a spade a spade," but Lucian attributes the phrase to Aristophanes. Later, Plutarch notes that "The Macedonians are a rude and clownish people who call a spade a spade."

At the time, a "spade" (σκαφη) was something like a bowl, so you could say, like, "Let's call a bowl a bowl."

Source: Random House

The More You Know: Apparently "spade" is also a racial slur that I'm surprised I've never heard, considering where I grew up:

Spade meaning 'a black person' is far more recent; it is first found in the early twentieth century. It derives from the black color of the suit of spades in a deck of playing cards.