He was classed by Francis Meres in his Palladis Tamia (1598) as one of the three leading contemporary satirists, with Joseph Hall and John Marston.
[1] Baptised 1565, Rankins was the elder son of Henry Rankyn, master of the Barber–Surgeons' Company in 1587, and Mary Robynson.
[3] Indeed, while his anti-theatrical Mirrour of 1587 apparently allied him with Puritan criticisms, he was involved in some fashion with the theatre beforehand and afterwards.
It has been suggested that he was insincere, and that, as a hack writer, he was paid for the pamphlet by the City of London corporation.
[2] Rankins wrote:[1] Before the Belvedere (1600) by John Bodenham are three seven-line stanzas, "A Sonnet to the Muse's Garden" by Rankins; who also contributed anonymously to the anthology Plato's Cap of 1604.