Description: We petrologically estimated SO2 emissions from 36 detected Plinian volcanic eruptions occurring at the Central American Volcanic Arc (CAVA) during the past 200,000 years. Using this record and simple parameterized relationships collected from past studies we derive estimates of maximum volcanic aerosol optical depth (AOD) and radiative forcing (RF) for each eruption. For selected CAVA eruptions comprising different SO2 emission strengths, AOD and RF time series are derived in parallel from simulations with the global aerosol model MAECHAM5-HAM. The model shows a relationship between stratospheric SO2 injection and maximum global mean AOD that is linear for smaller volcanic eruptions (〈4 Mt SO2), and non-linear for larger ones ("4 Mt SO2), which is qualitatively and quantitatively consistent with the relationship used in the simple parameterized method. Potential climate impacts of the selected CAVA eruptions are estimated using an earth system model of intermediate complexity by RF time series derived (1) directly from the global aerosol model, and (2) from the simple parameterized method assuming a 12-month exponential decay of global AOD. We find that while the maximum AOD and RF values are consistent between the two methods, their temporal evolutions are significantly different. As a result, simulated maximum temperature anomalies and the duration of the temperature response depend on which RF time series is used, varying between 2.1 K and 3.1 K and ~ 60 and 90 years for the largest eruption of the CAVA data set. The presented results can be used to estimate the volcanic forcing and potential climate impacts from sulfur emissions, sulfate aerosol or AOD data for any tropical eruption that reached the stratosphere in the past but also in the future.