noun.
Anything that has been sifted, or from which the coarse parts have been removed.
noun.
Refuse separated from goods, as spices, drugs, etc.: in the following passage applied to a low fellow. Compare trash in a similar use.
To sift or bolt; free from dross or dirt.
Hence— To pick out the fine or valuable parts of; cull out and select the best or most suitable parts or specimens of; sort out; select and assort, rejecting the bad or least suitable: as, to garble spices; to garble coins. See garbling the coinage, below. [Now only in technical use.]
To sort out parts of for a purpose, especially a sinister purpose; mutilate so as to give a false impression; sophisticate; corrupt: as, a garbled account of an affair; a garbled text or writing.
Synonyms Misquote, etc. (see mutilate); pervert, misrepresent, falsify.