diff --git a/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py b/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
index 50fbcac90a09ff77087d0c11a79513ee1772d061..3b53b67802d509cbc7ed1aa7fab5c8b6bf5cb229 100644
--- a/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
+++ b/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
@@ -831,6 +831,16 @@ class Crawler(object):
 
     @staticmethod
     def replace_name_with_referenced_entity_id(prop: db.Property):
+        """changes the given property in place if it is a reference property that has a name as
+        value
+
+        If the Property has a List datatype, each element is treated separately.
+        If the datatype is generic, i.e. FILE or REFERENCE, values stay unchanged.
+        If the value is not a string, the value stays unchanged.
+        If the query using the datatype and the string value does not uniquely identify an Entity,
+        the value stays unchanged.
+        If an Entity is identified, then the string value is replaced by the ID.
+        """
         if get_list_datatype(prop.datatype) is None:  # not a list
             if (isinstance(prop.value, str) and is_reference(prop.datatype) and
                     prop.datatype != db.FILE and prop.datatype != db.REFERENCE):  # datatype is a non-generic reference and value is a string