diff --git a/.readthedocs.yml b/.readthedocs.yml
index 3fac452..a5696a9 100644
--- a/.readthedocs.yml
+++ b/.readthedocs.yml
@@ -4,9 +4,6 @@ build:
   os: ubuntu-22.04
   tools:
     python: "3.10"
-  commands:
-    - rm -f docs/cid.rst docs/modules.rst
-    - python -m sphinx.ext.apidoc -o docs/ cid
 
 sphinx:
   configuration: docs/conf.py
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index a29e4cb..7f5cc9a 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -72,14 +72,12 @@ coverage: ## check code coverage quickly with the default Python
 	$(BROWSER) htmlcov/index.html
 
 docs: ## generate Sphinx HTML documentation, including API docs
-	rm -f docs/cid.rst
 	sphinx-apidoc -o docs/ --separate --no-toc cid
 	$(MAKE) -C docs clean
 	$(MAKE) -C docs html
 	$(BROWSER) docs/_build/html/index.html
 
 check-docs-ci: ## check documentation for CI
-	rm -f docs/cid.rst
 	sphinx-apidoc -o docs/ --separate --no-toc cid
 	$(MAKE) -C docs clean
 	$(MAKE) -C docs html
diff --git a/docs/conf.py b/docs/conf.py
index 1f03ed5..d358e4f 100755
--- a/docs/conf.py
+++ b/docs/conf.py
@@ -79,7 +79,7 @@
 
 # List of patterns, relative to source directory, that match files and
 # directories to ignore when looking for source files.
-exclude_patterns = ['_build']
+exclude_patterns = ['_build', 'modules.rst', 'cid.rst', 'cid.cid.rst', 'cid.base58.rst']
 
 # The reST default role (used for this markup: `text`) to use for all
 # documents.
diff --git a/docs/index.rst b/docs/index.rst
index 7a6b36f..8fbd0e0 100644
--- a/docs/index.rst
+++ b/docs/index.rst
@@ -14,7 +14,6 @@ Table of contents
    installation
    usage
    api_reference
-   cid
    contributing
    authors
    history