 He was born at Chislehurst, Kent, the second son of Robert Bacon (1479–1548) of Drinkstone, Suffolk, by his wife Eleanor (Isabel) Cage.He graduated from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in 1527, and, after a period in Paris, he entered Gray's Inn, being called to the Bar in 1533.Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Henry VIII gave him a grant of the manors of Redgrave, Botesdale and Gislingham in Suffolk, and Gorhambury, Hertfordshire.