hard-bitten

hard-bitten (comparative more hard-bitten, superlative most hard-bitten)

1. callous and toughened by experience
   • 1996, Victor Davis Hanson, Introduction to The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to The Peloponnesian War:

     Its author, we must remember, was above all a man of action, an elected official, a captain, a traveler, and a pragmatic intellectual, a successful combatant against warrior and disease alike, hardbitten and intimate with both privilege and disgrace, a man who suffered with and outlived most of the greatest men of his age.