diff --git a/docs/primitives.md b/docs/primitives.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f1f4fd1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/primitives.md
@@ -0,0 +1,104 @@
+# Mantle Primitives
+The mantle primitives define a set of generator interfaces that each mantle
+target must implement.  They are designed to be equivalent to the coreir
+primitives.
+
+## Arithmetic (arith)
+
+Issues:
+* Parameter names are not consistent (e.g. `n` vs `width`)
+* `cin, cout` parameters
+
+Generators:
+* `Add(n, cin, cout)` - **TODO: Different than coreir.add, which doesn't have cin or cout**
+* `Sub(n, cin, cout)` - **TODO: Same issue as add**
+* `Negate(width)`
+* `ASR(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+* `Mul(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+* `UDiv(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+* `SDiv(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+* `UMod(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+* `SMod(width)` - **TODO: Missing in mantle40**
+
+## Logic
+
+Issues:
+* mantle uses a `height` parameter whereas coreir generators are binary
+* `mantle40` uses `n` for `DefineReduce{Op}` parameter but `height` for
+  `Reduce{Op}`
+
+Generators:
+* `And(height, width)`
+* `ReduceAnd(height, width)`
+* `NAnd(height, width)`
+* `ReduceNAnd(height)`
+* `Not` - 1-bit invert
+* `Or(height, width)`
+* `ReduceOr(height)`
+* `NOr(height, width)`
+* `ReduceNOr(height)`
+* `XOr(height, width)`
+* `ReduceXOr(height)`
+* `NXOr(height, width)`
+* `ReduceNXOr(height)`
+* `Invert(width)` - **TODO: mantle40 uses `n` parameter for `Invert`**
+* `LSL(width, shift_amount)`
+* `LSR(width, shift_amount)`
+* `StaticLeftShift(width)` - **TODO: Should these primitives? Issue is that if we instantiate an LSL, we don't know if the shift input is constant or dynamic. We could have a pass that inspects all LSL/LSR instances and changes those with static shift amounts to only use wiring. Then we could just have LSL and LSR**
+* `StaticRightShift(width)`
+
+## Compare
+
+Issues:
+* Define+Instance variants of comparisons (e.g. `ULT(n)`) missing from
+  `mantle40`, they only have `Define{op}` variants
+
+Generators:
+* `EQ(n)`
+* `NE(n)`
+* `ULT(n)`
+* `ULE(n)`
+* `UGT(n)`
+* `UGE(n)`
+* `SLT(n)`
+* `SLE(n)`
+* `SGT(n)`
+* `SGE(n)`
+
+## Mux
+
+Issues:
+
+Generators:
+* `Mux(height, width)` - **TODO: mantle40 limited to heights `[2, 4, 8, 16]`**
+
+## Flip Flops (FF)
+
+Issues:
+* mantle has many more parameters not available in coreir, we could move to
+  having a basic FF primitive, then have these higher level features built on
+  top of them
+
+Generators:
+* `DFF(init, has_ce, has_reset, edge, sync)`
+* `SRFF(init, has_ce, has_reset, edge, sync)` - **TODO: Missing from mantle.coreir**
+* `RSFF(init, has_ce, has_reset, edge, sync)` - **TODO: Missing from mantle.coreir**
+* `JKFF(init, has_ce, has_reset, edge, sync)` - **TODO: Missing from mantle.coreir**
+* `TFF(init, has_ce, has_reset, edge, sync)` - **TODO: Missing from mantle.coreir**
+
+## LUT
+Issues:
+* mantle.coreir uses `init` parameter instead of `rom` (used by mantle40) and `N`
+  instead of `n`
+
+Generators:
+* `LUT(rom, n)` - `rom` is the initialization value, `n` is the number of bits
+  (optional, can be inferred from `rom`)
+
+## Memory
+
+Issues:
+* mantle.coreir has custom RAM implementation, should it just use the common.RAM?
+
+Generators:
+* `Memory(height, width, rom, readonly)` - **TODO: mantle.coreir does not have rom parameter and does not support ROMs. I think this is an old artifact of coreir lacking support for ROMs, which it should now support. also missing define+instance variant**