diff --git a/lib/spack/spack/test/spec_syntax.py b/lib/spack/spack/test/spec_syntax.py
index c4e4c9cdfe..ae19de177b 100644
--- a/lib/spack/spack/test/spec_syntax.py
+++ b/lib/spack/spack/test/spec_syntax.py
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@ class SpecSyntaxTest(unittest.TestCase):
     # ================================================================================
     # Parse checks
     # ================================================================================
-    def check_parse(self, expected, spec=None):
+    def check_parse(self, expected, spec=None, remove_arch=True):
         """Assert that the provided spec is able to be parsed.
            If this is called with one argument, it assumes that the string is
            canonical (i.e., no spaces and ~ instead of - for variants) and that it
@@ -70,6 +70,13 @@ def check_parse(self, expected, spec=None):
         if spec is None:
             spec = expected
         output = spack.spec.parse(spec)
+
+        # Remove architectures that get added by parser.
+        if remove_arch:
+            for spec in output:
+                for s in spec.traverse():
+                    s.architecture = None
+
         parsed = (" ".join(str(spec) for spec in output))
         self.assertEqual(expected, parsed)