I saw it for the first time this week.
I like accurate historical dramas, and this is pretty on the money. Life was hard and brutal, and the language coarse.
Some things are hard for me to watch though (but that is just me). I always try to play the game of "who would I be and what would I be doing if I were alive in that time?"
Which makes it uncomfortable to watch at times.
Indeed it's coarse but it's also Elizabethan at times, reminds me somewhat of True Grit (as least as how I remember it, it's been a while). I'm guessing it's also very realistic (as I did Unforgiven).
I enjoy it far more than any of the other HBO series, top notch writing and acting.