Enterprise Architecture is a very different discipline from software development (and even solution architecture), and are usually found in non-tech organizations (i.e. banks, insurance companies, etc).

EA is focussed on evaluating the business processes and technical solutions that make up the operations of a large scale organization. They try to identify and remove redundancy (e.g. multiple billing systems) and ensure the solutions in place (custom internal, or vendor purchases) are fit-for-purpose from technical, business, and strategic standpoints.

It’s very far removed from the practice of software development (since the correct solution, from an EA standpoint, might just be to stitch together a handful of vendor systems and do away with custom development completely).

Is this closer to System Analyst, or -- as it sounds -- even higher level, like strategic infrastructure acquisition?

Much higher level than a System Analyst. Enterprise Architects often work directly with the CIO/CTO to shape an organization’s long term technology strategy (i.e. 5+ year time horizons).

The idea being, they are supposed to be “architecting the enterprise”.

> an architect who was fairly new out of uni and did not know how to code, or have any real tech skills.

This sounds more like a sales-adjacent role that pitches a company’s tech product lineup to the likes of product managers and other non-technical people at potential clients companies. For these roles, having someone who isn’t too deep into the details of the technology can actually help connect with other non-technical customers. You quickly remove this person from leading meetings and insert someone with tech skills if the other side shows up with actual engineers, though.

No actual engineering team is going to have an “architect” fresh out of college who doesn’t code or otherwise understand the tech. Having someone architect a system without understanding it doesn’t make any sense.