Passed a liquid through a material to remove unwanted particles, or removed something undesirable from a group of items.
From Middle French 'filtrer', derived from Medieval Latin 'filtrum' meaning 'felt' or 'filtering cloth'. The original process used felt or cloth to separate solids from liquids, and the term expanded metaphorically to mean any kind of selective removal.
Your coffee filter and your social media feed filters use the same principle invented centuries ago—both separate what you want from what you don't. The word 'felt' hiding in 'filtrum' reminds us that medieval monks discovered this technique while making felt cloth!
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