diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..b1c6ddc9fc176d093cbb20f0099a6d2189d2c313
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,66 @@
+# Access Catalogue Data
+
+For general information on what is covered in this project, please
+visit <https://labs.onb.ac.at/en/dataset/catalogue/>. For now the
+following things are covered:
+
+* sru - Get catalogue data via SRU as etree-Elements
+* marc\_tools - Extract specific information from the catalogue data
+
+## Getting Started
+
+The module itself does not have special requirements.
+
+### Prerequisites
+
+You should use a recent Python version, 3.6 and up. If you want to
+make use of the included tests for the marc\_tools, you will need
+to install the module `pytest`.
+
+### Usage
+
+If you want to access ÖNB catalogue data, you can use the following
+import statement to get started:
+
+`from catalogue import onbsru`
+
+And then instantiate the OnbRecordRetriever class:
+
+`myinstance = onbsru.OnbRecordRetriever()`
+
+For now this will allow you to retrieve one specific record via one of
+the following unique IDs:
+
+* barcode - Barcode
+* ac\_num - ID within the Austrian Library Network
+* mms\_id - Ex Libris Alma's internal ID
+
+For example:
+
+`myinstance.by_ac_num("AC12345678")`
+
+## Running the tests
+
+Right now there is only one test file for the extraction of
+MARC-categories. The tests are implemented using pytest.
+
+### Testing the patterns for marc\_extractor
+
+These tests will check if marc\_extractor.py is accepting the right
+kinds of patterns and rejecting the wrong ones.
+
+`pytest marc_tools/tests/test_marc_extractor.py`
+
+# Built With
+
+* Python3
+
+# Authors
+
+* **Stefan Karner** - Senior Developer
+* **Gabriele Höfler** - Junior Developer
+
+# License
+
+This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file
+for details.